


2021

by pebbles1971



Series: Older and Wiser [8]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Grief/Mourning, M/M, Mild Kink, Neurodiversity, Nonbinary Character, Parenthood, Torture, Trans Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-30
Updated: 2019-06-30
Packaged: 2020-05-31 04:47:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,473
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19418791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pebbles1971/pseuds/pebbles1971
Summary: Seven years on from their wedding, the universe turns life upside down for John and Rodney





	2021

**Author's Note:**

> This is a stand-alone story in the “Older and Wiser” verse, knowledge of the previous tales may help but it’s not essential. My apologies to those who thought I’d leave it with the happy ending – there were boxes the story opened that needed to be explored. 
> 
> Content note: the story contains a terror attack, major grief and loss, torture, a brief, slightly kinky sex scene, and trans/non-binary characters. More detailed spoilery content warning at end. 

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5, Southern Spring Equinox +54**

**[Earth date: March 10 th, 2021]**

**Location: Atlantis**

John woke up in their huge bed, feeling a warm bulk against him, and his heart leapt.

_It’s okay, he’s right here._

But then he saw dreads poking out from beneath the Athosian blanket. Ronon. His long back pressed reassuringly to John’s, spooned around Selin, trying to hold them all together even when everything was falling apart.

Memory slammed into John. He curled in on himself, as if trying to stop his insides from spilling everywhere.

He couldn’t move from it, couldn’t breathe from it. Didn’t want to ever sleep again if it meant one more time waking up and having to bear that realisation snaking into him along with consciousness.

Two months gone, and it wasn’t getting any easier.

John had always thought it would be him that died on a mission leaving Rodney to grieve. The worst part of loving someone so damn much was realising that he couldn’t bear the thought of Rodney going through what he was going through now. He had always secretly known it was going to be easier being the dead one, and now he felt fury at himself for having been so ready to die so many times as much as he felt pissed at Rodney for getting himself killed.

Even though of course the last person to blame for any of this was Rodney, he still felt irrationally angry at him for not being here.

Nothing he was feeling made sense, and his anger quickly turned in on him and he hated himself for feeling so angry. Then it spiralled back outward, and he just wanted to be a soldier again so he could slice up the fucking Genii with a P90, or a nuke.

Or one of Rodney’s new laser weapons. That would be poetic.

Only they had decided retribution would only make things worse, and he knew a couple of hundred dead Genii wouldn’t bring Rodney back.

Of course it had been the Genii. Well, by now he knew the Genii people were lovely, it was their fucked up, paranoid leadership that were the issue.

The wraith all but gone, the Genii had done their best to destroy what promised to be a new era of peace and prosperity, at least in _this_ galaxy. Not just taking out Rodney, but murdering Dr Priya Mirchandani, the UN’s Pegasus envoy, and so many more. John had loved Priya, too, and there was room in his battered heart to feel her loss keenly, and the loss of so many other lives, no matter how it was eclipsed by the absence of Rodney McKay.

Mostly John just ached. Between the bursts of rage and hate it was like someone had turned on a super-powered magnet that pulled at the very blood in his veins, tugging him to the ground, making it hard to even move.

He knew he couldn’t just leave Ronon to pick up the pieces on his own, but he was frozen, unable to face the hollow look in Selin’s eyes, the pity from his colleagues, Teyla’s weary tears, Ronon’s sorrowful, compassionate quiet.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5, Northern Spring Equinox +99**

**[Earth date: July 8, 2020]**

**Location: Atlantis**

‘Rodney, she’s eight in earth years, she can walk to the school on her own. It’s safe here.’

‘Yes, she can,’ Rodney’s pressed his lips together and hoped John knew he meant business, ‘but she’s _not going to._ ’ He knew he could be rigid sometimes, but this time he was right, dammit, and not going to back down.

‘She likes to be independent,’ John insisted, clanking the dishes he was washing with what Rodney felt was unnecessary aggression. The clanking, of course, got on his last nerve, and he wondered for a moment if John was unconsciously using Rodney’s autism against him. He took in a breath, refusing to let this blow into a full-on row, but it was pretty close.

‘Yes, and it isn’t necessarily healthy.’ Since Selin had come to them a little over a year ago, she had remained a quiet little self-contained ghost. Acting like the adult for the younger Caradian orphans she had been found with, who had been placed with other families. Never seeming to need much for herself. She was the easiest child in the world, and that bothered the hell out of Rodney.

‘You’re making things more complicated than they need to be, McKay,’ John growled, dumping a pot into the suds and then swearing as he splattered the front of his habitual black tee.

‘Read the damn books, Sheppard!’

John winced, and Rodney instantly regretted saying that. He had finally cottoned onto the fact that John couldn’t focus on a book for very long, if at all, and had developed quite an aversion to reading. War and Peace had nearly ended up in San Francisco bay after John realised that in five years he’d managed less than a quarter of it. Rodney had been meaning to get some more ADHD-friendly audiobooks or podcasts on attachment and adoption, but communication with Earth being what it was, nothing was easy these days.

Some days he surprised himself at how much he was lapping up all the soft science when it came to understanding his adopted child. Carson was constantly teasing him for “spouting psychobabble” over lunch.

‘Why don’t we ask Ronon what he thinks?’ John angled, scrubbing intently at the burn marks from Ronon’s latest attempt at cooking. The scraping of the brush against metal just about ended Rodney’s attempts to hold onto a semblance of calm. He rolled his eyes and tutted.

‘Why don’t we sit down with our co-parent and talk it through until we figure out something that works all round, or why don’t you see if Ronon will take your side against me?’ Rodney snipped.

John had the decency to look sheepish at that, ducking his head to focus on the scrubbing.

‘Just because you two love each other doesn’t mean he’s going to let you manoeuvre him on this. He’s too smart for that, John.’ _And he’s done the reading,_ he didn’t add.

‘Rodney, he loves you too,’ John clearly realised he had ground to make up here. He gave up on the singed pan, letting it soak. Wiping the suds off his hands, he sidled over to Rodney and slipped his hands round Rodney’s waist. Rodney resisted for all of a nanosecond before pressing into John’s warmth.

Rodney knew Ronon loved him. He also knew Ronon had a bond with John that was unique. Platonic, but deep. He’d once called it a “bromance” but that was dismissive. Since Selin had come into their lives and the three of them had made the decision to co-parent her, they had become a unit again, a team. Realising that there were two other people in John’s life that were as important as him made Rodney surprisingly happy.

‘I know he does, but he loves you more,’ Rodney said without a shred of jealousy. ‘And that’s exactly why he won’t play this game.’

He had once thought himself too selfish to share anyone. Now, he didn’t see it that way at all. Seeing Ronon wrap John up in a bear hug or swing Selin in between the two of them made Rodney feel warm and safe. Like there were more hands on the tiller, holding them all steady. In spite of (because of?) what John and Ronon had, and the love they both had for Selin, Rodney never felt anything but secure in this family.

Which was why he also trusted Ronon not to let John manipulate him into taking John’s side in something. They would talk it through, like they always did, and Rodney would remind them both of the need to help Selin let go, to be a child again, to not rush to grow up and bear the world on her shoulders. Babying her a little was necessary. Taking her maturity for granted – not so much.

‘Rodney, I didn’t mean to –’ John had that look he got when he was feeling things and didn’t like it.

‘It’s ok, John.’ Rodney pulled John a little closer and softened his voice. ‘We’ll talk about it – together.’

He sometimes forgot that motherless John had been packed off to boarding school by age eight. Sensitive, clever, hard to handle and hyperactive, his dad had simply packed him off for someone else to deal with, and John had quickly learned to fend for himself. Which made Rodney’s own rather cold childhood look positively cosy. Neither of them had a great template for giving Selin the love she needed, and sometimes the thought of that overwhelmed him. It turned out that Ronon had had the most functional childhood of the three of them – until his family were culled. But that only helped Ronon understand Selin better than Rodney or John could ever hope to. Ronon was the strongest link in their chain, and they both knew it.

 _‘Unscheduled offworld activation.’_ The radios blared with the usual alarm attached to that announcement, scattering Rodney’s thoughts. The noise as ever hurt his ears, but he resisted clamping his hands over them and instead adjusted into work mode.

Since relations with SGC had deteriorated, senior staff were notified of any unexpected gate activity. The two of them dropped the conversation and jumped into a transporter. In less than a minute, they were in the gateroom, where Teyla Emmagen, Lantea’s elected Governor and both John and Rodney’s immediate boss, was patiently refusing to lower the shield for someone with an increasingly frustrated but steadfastly polite Kansas accent.

The voice was instantly recognisable.

‘Teyla, lord knows things are weird just now, but I promise, we only want to talk, and frankly if SGC wanted to invade, they could oh I dunno, send one of the twenty interstellar spaceships we now have.’

Teyla’s eyebrow rose, and a tiny chink appeared in her usual unflappable calm. She ran a dark hand through her shoulder-length, only slightly greying hair, and then her habitual serenity reasserted itself. She drew an even breath and her hands stilled by her sides.

‘I do not believe such a veiled threat will help persuade me of your good intent, Colonel,’ Teyla rebutted, her voice betraying nothing but her infinite patience.

‘Are we really here, Teyla? We can’t even trust Cam Mitchell?’ John sighed but didn’t look like he was really disagreeing. The days of close bonds between Atlantis and the US Military were very long behind them, even if there was still a special place in all their hearts for SG1’s former members.

‘We cannot trust the US government, John, and you know we cannot. And they, despite seven years of assurances that they would relinquish it, still control Earth’s stargate, and still employ Cameron Mitchell.’

‘Is Rodney there, Teyla?’ another voice spoke this time, unmistakably that of John’s former XO, Evan Lorne. Rodney could feel a little alarm go off at something in Evan’s voice, even as he felt an urge to trust the man.

‘I’m here, Evan.’

‘McKay – Rodney, is there anything you could do to make it safe? A shield or something? Put us in the brig, I don’t care – just please let us through.’ There was an unmistakable edge of fear, maybe even panic, in Lorne’s voice.

‘Oh, actually . . .’ Rodney whirled his hands as he grasped what he needed to do, then in seconds he was tapping into one of the laptops, ‘there, I’ve created a shielded containment area in front of the gate, that will separate from the gate itself as soon as they come through.’

John was looking at him with a gratifyingly soft expression. Oh yeah, John was still hot for Rodney’s brains after nearly seven years of marriage.

‘What?’ Rodney smirked, ‘I’ve been working on this for a while.’

‘Is it nuke proof?’ John asked, his expression going back to hard. Because the way things were right now, being nuked by their own people was within the realms of possibility.

‘Yes, and any explosion would be kept from blowing the gate. We can let them through.’

‘Still,’ John touched his com, ‘extra security to the gateroom immediately, all off-duty staff respond.’ As Teyla’s deputy, security fell under John’s purview. There were already 20 security officers there, uniformed in the androgynous brown uniform tunics peculiar to Atlantis.

Teyla opened the com. ‘Okay, Colonels, you may come through, provided we have your assurances that you are alone and unarmed. Please note that you will be contained within a shielded area when you step through the gate. And we will collapse the shield should you not comply.’

Cam and Evan appeared through the event horizon and the shield immediately flickered around them. Rodney was struck by how scared and haggard the two men looked. Two pairs of blue eyes looked at the guns around them with resignation. They both had their arms up, empty-handed.

Rodney used every possible scan on them, nevertheless.

‘They’re clean, there’s no Goa’uld, nanite, or any other alien presence, and they have no explosives, biological agents or technology on their person.’

‘Okay, Rodney, you may drop the shield, thank you,’ Teyla said. To the security below, which had now doubled, she said ‘hold your positions and do not lower your weapons.’

The three of them ran down the steps to confront their visitors.

Cam smiled ruefully, but Evan was uncharacteristically solemn. In fact, he looked almost as if he was going to cry. Rodney wasn’t always great at reading faces, but he didn’t have to be – something was terribly wrong. Cam stood close against Evan as if to give him comfort.

‘I really don’t blame you folks for reacting like that. Thanks for letting us through.’ Then Cam did the oddest thing – he slowly reached up to the shoulder of his uniform and ripped the US flag right off. The security detail tensed but did not otherwise react to the clearly un-hostile act. Evan met his eyes and did the same.

Rodney noted their ranks had not changed since the couple had outed themselves, Evan was a Lt. Colonel, Cam full bird for over a decade, which made Rodney wonder why they stayed in and how much it had been a choice. It still wasn’t ok to be gay in the US military, in fact by now, maybe it was harder than ever. John had got out at the right time, back in 2012.

‘I guess you’ll be taking us to the brig,’ Cam said evenly.

‘I am afraid so,’ Teyla responded, showing regret and resolve all at once.

‘Evan, what’s going on?’ John asked his former right hand, looking worried.

‘We’re done with them, sir.’ Evan addressed John according to old habit. ‘We wish to seek asylum.’ Lorne’s eyes were wet with unspilled tears.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5, Southern Spring Equinox +58**

**[Earth date: March 13 th, 2021]**

**Location: Atlantis**

Cam wrapped his arms tight around John, forming a tight band of pressure around him that paradoxically somewhat loosened the constant tightness that lived inside his chest. John wanted to pull away, but instead, clung. Cam never minded that. Nor did Evan, who just curled his arms around them both, tilting his head against John’s.

John’s eyes were wet and he _ached_ like he couldn’t bear. He wished he could just be numb, but everyone around him was intent on making him feel.

Rodney had, in the end, broken down all John’s barriers and right now he wished he could go back to being John the untouchable. His friends, particularly Cam, Evan, Teyla and Ronon, were liberal with touch and affection. It wasn’t new, but it had intensified. He needed it and he hated it. Demisexual as he was, he had no cravings for sex without Rodney, wondered if he ever would when love and attraction for him were so rare, but his skin hunger was acute.

At the same time, every touch reminded him of what he had lost and would never have again.

Selin came into the room and saw the print-outs on the table. Jeannie had sent photos.

The wide-eyed little girl looked at them for a long moment, then her lip began to wobble. John tensed, because so often lately Selin’s emotions had been like a tornado turning everything upside down – physically as well as metaphorically. But today, she simply looked sad as her brown eyes locked on the smiling pictures of her Pa looking up from the table.

John reached his arm out from the middle of the huddle, curling a hand into her wavy brown hair and drew her inside.

Rodney had been right, of course. They needed to work through Selin’s self-containment, just like they had worked through John’s and thank god it had happened before Rodney died. A tearful, needy, angry, brattish kid was far more normal than the quiet, perfect little mini adult she had been before. So much like a young John, in fact, that he had not seen how big of a problem it was.

‘I miss him so much,’ Selin choked out, and John dropped to his knees and held on tightly, Cam and Evan steadying both their shoulders. Thank god, he thought. Thank god she could talk about this, in a way he never could when he lost his mother.

‘Me too, baby. It’s okay to miss him, though. How could we not?’ He brushed tears away from her golden skin, his chest aching.

‘It’s been two months – will it get better?’ John’s heart just dropped at that. He couldn’t imagine not missing Rodney, not aching for him. He didn’t even want to think about being over him.

Cam squeezed both their shoulders at once. ‘In a couple of years, maybe. Don’t rush it.’

John relaxed. That was exactly the right answer.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5, Northern Midsummer +76**

**[Earth date: December 14 th, 2020]**

**Location: Atlantis**

It was always great to see Dr Priya Mirchandani, the former UN Mission Leader of Atlantis and now UN Envoy to Pegasus. And one of John and Rodney’s favourite humans and dearest friends. Priya had been responsible for hiring newly civilian John back to Atlantis when they thought he could never return. This was after the UN had got the US military out back in 2012 (with a little help from John), and before it became independent from Earth in 2016.

Priya was wearing a Punjabi suit in dark green, the scarf loose on her shoulders. Her greying hair was these days cut to almost military shortness. Her round face was showing just the slightest touch of age, but she was as handsome as ever.

Next to Priya was a curiously androgynous person that Rodney had not met. Intense brown eyes peered out from beneath heavily braided hair that framed dark skin. High cheekbones, full lips and a strong jaw made it impossible to place their gender. Priya introduced them as Chanis, her Latiran counterpart, Pegasus Envoy to the UN.

Rodney found himself drawn to Chanis, struggling to take his eyes off them. He loved not being able to tell if Chanis was male or female (or neither, he realised, as gender was not seen as binary in many parts of Pegasus). It was a familiar thrill – not attraction exactly, more a sense of recognition, of homecoming, that was so powerful it made him almost dizzy.

Priya embraced John and Rodney warmly, and he brought his attention back from Chanis and noticed Priya’s eyes looked tired and tense.

‘It’s all going to shit, isn’t it?’ Rodney accurately read her expression. This was Priya, and he’d by now learned all her tells.

‘It’s . . . well, you’ll hear in the briefing. But yes, things are a tad fucked.’ Her clipped British accent never failed to give Priya’s copious swearing an air of gentility.

It was the middle of Lantea 3’s short day when they held the briefing. The conference room was packed. Folk stood against the walls, Satedan, Athosian, Manarian, Hoffan, even a couple of defected Genii, representatives of all the native people of Pegasus (close to a million souls) who dwelt on Atlantis, as well as Earthers, who were now a small minority here.

The UN made a point of not doing things behind closed doors.

Teyla, who had been Atlantean Mission Leader since 2014 (year zero in the New Atlantean Calendar) and Lantea 3 elected Governor since 2016, chaired the meeting and welcomed everyone, but quickly handed over to Priya, her former boss.

‘Thank you, everyone. As you all know, the political situation on Earth worsens by the day, and we cannot avoid the fact that the huge array of ships, technology and weaponry accumulated by SGC is now effectively in private hands, as is the country they reside in. Democracy has crumbled in the US and UK, and elsewhere. Our plans to declassify the Stargate Program stalled when the planned handover to the UN was aborted. A private company now runs SGC and the UN’s hopes that the technology we have found in the stars would solve the Earth’s problems, have met with some truly terrifying and dangerous manoeuvring from forces that do not want things to change if it means they lose control.

‘It seems that the impending environmental catastrophe Earth faces has propelled certain powers into a desperate scramble for its resources.

‘The UN Space Corps no longer have access to gate travel to Earth, and our fleet has been forced back to our own Milky Way Alpha site. It is not war, exactly, but we have been forced off Earth and I do not see us pushing back any time soon. We still travel to Earth by ship and use beaming tech, and can gate to Pegasus from the Alpha site, but I suspect were we to go to Earth with anything more than a small craft, we would meet SGC’s growing fleet. We hear little from SGC personnel that remained, and we fear for them.’

Rodney wondered where Sam was. He missed her. She had got out of SGC at the time of the aborted handover and her current location, as with O’Neil, Teal’c, Jackson, Vala and others’ was closely guarded. She hadn’t visited Atlantis in a long time, even though they emailed and video messaged each other regularly and still managed to co-author papers.

Neither Rodney nor Sam had been safe to return to Earth to accept their joint Nobel for advancements in theoretical physics last year, and Rodney realised he felt more wistful about not seeing Sam than about missing his moment of glory. John’s overwhelming pride had been more than enough for him to bask in.

He realised he’d been drifting and missed what Priya was saying.

‘. . . I am frankly amazed to see Colonels Mitchell and Lorne here, and in one piece.’ She nodded to the two men standing at the back of the room. Cam ducked his head and Rodney could see a flush in his cheeks.

‘That’s because we went along with far too much, until we took our chance to defect,’ Cam said. ‘Neither of us is proud of living to tell the tale, and others weren’t so lucky. But getting out with the Generals wasn’t an option for us.’

Teyla gave Cam and Evan a gentle look, ‘I would like to point out that the intelligence Colonels Mitchell and Lorne brought with them has been invaluable, and that they took an enormous risk coming here. They may berate themselves, but the fact remains, the safe thing would have been for them to stay at SGC, and their defection was nothing short of heroic.’

‘Agreed,’ said John, who was at Teyla’s side, as her Deputy. ‘It takes enormous character to step outside a chain of command you’re used to obeying and leave a country you devoted yourself to fighting for. To risk your life doing it, that’s true courage.’ John smiled up at Cam, and Rodney felt warmed to see another sign of the burgeoning friendship between the two men. Mitchell was nothing like the all-American macho man Rodney had always believed him to be. Actually, Rodney was growing pretty fond of both Cam and Evan, and he was getting to know John’s former XO in a way he never could when the man was stationed here previously and deep in the DADT closet.

‘I cannot thank you enough, gentlemen, for the intel you brought,’ Priya continued, after acknowledging Teyla and John’s words with a nod. ‘And am happy you have taken roles with the UN Space Corps. You have helped us make decisions that are now coming to fruition. It’s time I shared what the UN’s plan is to ensure Atlantis does not end up at war with SGC forces, nor do they extend their domination beyond Earth.’

The room fell even more silent, a look of hope on some faces, worry and scepticism on others. Rodney’s own was some way between the two.

‘Our strength is that we are finally learning to do the very opposite of what many Earthers - the British, Americans and private interests mainly, have always done and continue to do. They have railroaded indigenous populations and taken over, either for “their own good” or out of selfish interests.’

There was vigorous nodding from the Earthers in the room at this comment.

‘Instead, we are building coalitions. And we feel strongly that if we do not empower other cultures, the US and SGC will surely colonise them. In the Milky way Teal’c’s Free Jaffa are more comfortable dealing with the UN, and they are helping us establish relations with other worlds. In time, there will be many free worlds and we hope that Earthers will have friends throughout the galaxy, and the galaxy will have the UN Space Corps’ protection alongside an Allied Fleet.’

‘You’re talking about a federation!’ Rodney couldn’t help a shared smile with John at this notion.

‘I suppose I am, Rodney,’ Priya smiled, but then suddenly looked grave. ‘There is hope among the stars even if Earth is lost. We pray it will not come to that, but we are focussing on keeping the Milky Way free of Earth’s dominion, and we are also working with the more developed worlds to grow our intergalactic fleet.

‘The one major advantage we have is our allyship with Atlantis, and Rodney’s ZedPM factory, which is a joint Lantean/UN project. SGC have cut themselves off from this by their faithless actions, and they are years away from having the technology themselves. We had hoped that ZedPM technology would transform Earth and halt climate change, but at present it is politically impossible to bring the technology to Earth without starting an all-out war. However, we can begin to help the Pegasus and Milky Way galaxies to develop, and we need to do that in ways that ensure power does not once again fall into private hands. Power and technology for the people is our aim, the UN and Lantean government are agreed on this.’

Teyla nodded. ‘Too long has this galaxy been inhibited by the wraith, and now they are all but beaten back, with no cullings since Caradia,’ John and Rodney both winced at mention of their daughter’s world and its brutal culling. ‘An opportunity to advance is most welcome, and it seems essential for our ongoing liberation.’

Rodney felt suddenly queasy. Much as he had discussed it endlessly with Priya and Teyla, this still felt too much like the interventionism the expedition had been guilty of when they first came to Pegasus, and it was his work that would be driving it. He knew he was supposed to put up a united front for the sake of the UN, his employer, and Teyla, his boss (and wasn’t that complicated, having a boss who did not work for your employer, but somehow, they managed it).

No, whether it was his principles or his autism or both, he couldn’t hold the words inside.

‘Thrilled as I am to see the UN moving away from its US Imperialist roots, aren't we still inflicting our values on other cultures?’ he asked bluntly. Priya just smiled at him, not taking his words amiss. She was by now used to his plain (tactless) way of speaking.

‘I hear you Rodney,’ she said, ‘which is why we will work this so that we leave the technology in trust to the people of each planet that wants it, in accordance with their own political systems. We will not have control. In crude terms, on a capitalist planet the people will be given shares in the technology and a collectivist culture like the Athosians will have shared ownership. We plan to ensure every culture on Pegasus that wants one will have a ZedPM and shield technology to defend it.’

‘It terrifies me giving tech like this to cultures like the Genii,’ said John, probably speaking for a few round the table, given the number of nods. Even the defected Genii seemed to concur.

‘I agree,’ said Priya, ‘but given that Earth have ZedPMs and more and given the horrors we are capable of, I hardly think we're in a position to decide who does and doesn't get access. All we can do is seek assurances the tech will be used for the benefit of all and held in shared ownership. Certainly, we must bring the Genii to the table.’

Priya went on to describe the summit that would be held four weeks hence at a secret location. Later, she, Teyla, John and her

head of security, a quiet and rather sweet Hoffan woman called Jara Gueran, mapped out the security details and final plans. They were the only four people who knew the location of the talks. Later, John told Rodney approvingly he had never seen such a thorough security plan as the one Jara had put together.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5, Northern Midsummer +89**

**[Earth date: December 25 th, 2020]**

**Location: Atlantis**

What a difference a year makes, John thought, looking down at the sleeping form snuggled against Rodney in their bed. His heart swelled at the sight. Last year, Selin had been in her own bed, a little invisible wall around her. She had opened presents politely and given them a thin, forced smile. John was very happy now to put up with tantrums, manipulation, the emotional rollercoaster of loving a traumatised kid, to see her finally letting her guard down and being more than just a Stepford child.

Okay, having Selin in their bed put paid to the long-standing Christmas Blowjob tradition, but the feeling of seeing Rodney snuggled up with their gorgeous, complicated child was worth so much more. He gently ruffled her dark hair without waking her, watching her eyelashes flutter and throw shadows across her golden cheek.

John’s cell phone beeped gently. Atlantis finally had its own homegrown phone provider now serving a city of close to a million people. The text was from Ronon.

_Ready for Santa?_

John texted back. _Sure thing, big guy!_ 😊

He nudged Selin and Rodney awake with kisses for both of them. There were grumbles in stereo, but Selin was first to raise her head off the pillow.

‘Hey, Pa, it’s Christmas! Time for enforced jollity.’ Taking great delight in using his own words against him, Selin prodded Rodney til he groaned and stirred.

Rodney was _Pa_ , John was _Da_ , and Ronon used the common Satedan abbreviation of father, _Fa._ They hadn’t pushed Selin to use anything beyond their names. But sometime around September she had finally made the switch, taking great amusement in playing around with all the intergalactic permutations of _father_ until she found something that worked, and nodded to Rodney’s French (on his mother’s side), John’s Irish and Ronon’s Satedan heritage.

Soon enough, the door swung open with a ‘ho, ho ho!’ and in came Ronon in the traditional red suit, his (much shorter these days) dreadlocks springing out from under a Santa hat.

‘Dreadlock Santa should definitely catch on,’ John smiled at him. ‘And you totally have the right amount of beard.’ Over the years, Ronon’s beard had grown impressively. But what had really changed was the warmth and peace in the man’s eyes.

Selin’s eyes were fixed on the enormous sack of presents. Ronon crawled up the bed and kissed his daughter and each of his co-parents, then settled down behind Rodney, with his chin on Rodney’s shoulder, watching Selin dive into the sack. There were gifts from Cam and Evan, Teyla, Kanaan, Charyn and Torren, and of course a load of stuff from her three dads. Very little was Earth-made this year, as it was less easy to ship things from the Milky Way with Earth’s stargate access lost and the UN taking care when running ships into Earth orbit. But Atlantis was now a centre of trade, and all sorts of interesting things showed up in the shops here.

Rodney muttered that it was a bit excessive compared to the bag of nuts, an apple and a candy bar that had been the contents of his Christmas stockings as a child, but of course he had contributed the most because he spoiled Selin whenever possible. Overall, Rodney’s gifts tended to be educational, Ronon’s creative, and John’s silly and fun, and she seemed to appreciate them all equally.

‘For a bullshit capitalist holiday, Christmas is way cool,’ Selin grinned, when she was done and picking out a simple tune on the mandolin-like instrument her Fa had given her.

‘Oh, she so picked that expression off you, Rodney,’ said John, rolling his eyes.

‘Nuh-uh,’ Rodney countered, I would never say anything as ridiculously American as _way cool_.’

John just grinned – he could see a bit of all three of them in Selin, as well as a hefty dose of her own Caradian spirit. But her _way cool_ and her high fives and her love of being up high and going fast were from John, just as her questioning and investigative nature were influenced by Rodney and her creativity and the fierce need to defend anyone in trouble was from Ronon. There was also a philosophical streak and a way with words that was entirely her own.

‘Sel, wanna go take a walk to see Charyn and Torren?’ Ronon asked once the wrappings were cleared away and they’d breakfasted on sweet Athosian pastries. His eyes smiled conspiratorially at John and Rodney. Selin’s face lit up. Charyn was only a quarter-year older than her, and the two girls were increasingly close.

Selin hugged Rodney and John. Her hugs now were heartfelt and close, where once they had been stiff and formal. She smelled of the pastries she’d had for breakfast and the hair oil she and Ronon both used on their dry hair. Sometimes, when she hugged him like this. John didn’t want to let go. But he _did_ want some alone time with Rodney.

‘Enjoy your grown-up time!’ she said with a smirk as she slipped out of the bed and went to her room to get dressed. Rodney raised his eyes at John, but John just echoed his daughter’s smirk.

Their apartment adjoined Ronon’s, with Selin’s bedroom sandwiched in between, not that she often slept in it these days. Part of helping her to attach was letting her do the things that a very young child would do, like sleep in her parents’ bed. Mostly, that bed was John and Rodney’s just because it was roomier. Well, enormous. When she was struggling with the worst flashbacks from the culling, all three of them kept watch over her, and the bed was easily big enough for the four of them.

Christmas wasn’t a general holiday on Atlantis anymore, but this year it had fallen on a rest day, so Teyla and Kanaan would be off too. Knowing Ronon, he would take all the kids out and let them have some privacy too. He loved being a dad and generally loved anybody’s kids, if not as much as he loved Selin. He didn’t seem to have much time for girlfriends these days. Amelia had gone back to Earth long ago. He just hadn’t seemed able to commit to her, or her to him, and John wondered sometimes if Melena had been it for Ronon in the same way he knew there had been, and would be, nobody in his life like Rodney for him. Ronon seemed entirely content with his life, even so.

‘We’ll be gone an hour at least. Have fun,’ Ronon gave them both an enormous grin.

John watched him go with a wave of affection, and then turned to look at Rodney, and got caught by those wide blue eyes. _Fuck._ He was still completely gone on this man, even after seven years of marriage. Rodney was fifty-two now, and the laugh lines had proliferated, but the frown lines seemed to have almost lessened. There were streaks of grey in his wavy brown hair, which he wore a lot longer these days, adding to his mad professor persona. John liked it, it softened him.

Rodney was still as gorgeous as ever. In fact, age had only made him hotter. As John peeled Rodney out of his clothes, he took pleasure in seeing Rodney’s leaner and more muscled frame. He comfort-ate less, because he was happy, because there were fewer crises, because he’d figured a lot of stuff out about himself, and because a lot of the worst junk food was no longer available or was at least a rare treat. He came running with John and Ronon now after they dropped Selin at school and he kept up his sparring, although now it was with Jinto.

John knew Rodney had a complicated relationship with his body, but he seemed to inhabit it more comfortably these days.

His own body, on the other hand, was a little less muscled and was flabbier than it used to be, and his post-50 body hair was getting to be more salt than pepper. After his chopper crash in 2013, John never quite got back to the level of fitness he had before. He got seized up with pain when the weather turned, and his hypermobile joints gave him more trouble as he aged than he’d like to admit.

Rodney pushed him out of his PJs and didn’t seem to mind the view, however.

‘So fucking gorgeous, John,’ his lover pressed him back into the pillows and kissed his way down John’s body, making him moan. Rodney took his time teasing John’s nipples, then slid lower, teasing around his thighs and groin and carefully avoiding his already full erection.

‘Fucking cock-tease, McKay,’ John said, with no heat whatever. He loved being teased and Rodney knew it.

Rodney smiled up at him. ‘You know my plans are always good, Sheppard.’ And with that he dove onto John’s cock, sucking him in hard and firm.

‘Fuck!’ John exclaimed, his hips lifting right off the bed.

Firm hands gripped his hips and held him back down. Just being held down was heaven, let alone the feel of Rodney’s perfect mouth on his cock. This really wasn’t going to last. Rodney was going for it now, using his hand, his tongue, his teeth (gently) and John was squirming in the firm, one-handed grip pushing him down against the bed.

John wasn’t someone who had felt sexual many times in his life. He didn’t really get hot for someone unless he was in love, and he had only really been in love with Rodney. But Rodney lit him up the way John lit up Ancient tech, had him vibrating and humming with energy that he knew shone out of him.

‘God, you’re beautiful like this,’ Rodney stopped for just a moment, looking up at John in something like awe. John _felt_ beautiful and welcomed Rodney’s gaze even though before Rodney he hated to be looked at. He reached down to cup Rodney’s cheek.

‘Love you so fucking much.’

Rodney licked the length of his cock and then fell back to sucking it, this time using the hand that wasn’t still pinning him down (oh god, he needed pressure as much as he needed touch), to play with his balls, and stroke his perineum. And then Rodney’s reached his fingers up for John to suck them and moved them back down to tease at his hole, giving him all the right kinds of shivers. As Rodney’s clever fingers pushed their way in and quickly found his prostate, he cried out Rodney’s name and came hard, with Rodney sucking him through repeated pulses and shudders until he felt almost shattered.

Rodney crawled his way back up John’s body and kissed him, long and slow, giving him time to put himself back together again. John twined his fingers into Rodney’s longish hair and deepened the kiss, letting his tongue do the talking. Rodney’s erection pressed into him, but he seemed in no hurry to do anything about it. Eventually, John pushed him back far enough to take a breath, and said,

‘So, I would suggest you fuck me but . . .’

‘The Christmas Blowjob is now an established tradition, hey?’ Rodney twinkled.

‘Exactly,’ said John. ‘So . . .’ he felt suddenly shy.

It had been a while since they had done anything kinky. Parenthood meant it had been a while since they’d done much of anything at all. But Rodney seemed to pick up where he was going with this.

‘Oh.’ His eyes glittered. ‘Oh. Yes.’

John reached under the bed and pulled out the lined leather cuffs. He handed them to Rodney.

‘Put them on me?’

Rodney obliged, fixing John’s hands together above his head and his legs splayed and fixed to the bed legs. What had started for John as a sensory thing – any pressure, being pressed on, held down, restrained, felt incredible – had become so much more in their time together, an act of trust and of love, knowing Rodney could be allowed complete control of his body and that nothing would ever harm him.

Rodney looked down at him, splayed out and vulnerable on the bed, and his look was worshipful, awed. Submission had nothing to do with this, not for John. He felt powerful. Maybe once upon a time his fucked up belief that he was just a body for everyone’s use would have woven its way into this somehow, but Rodney had helped him lose that script a long time ago, had made him be okay with having his own wants and needs.

‘Tell me what you want?’ Rodney asked, seeming suddenly unsure.

‘You know what I want,’ John said breathlessly. ‘Get up here and fuck my face.’

Rodney’s blue eyes went wide and held John’s as he slid up his body. They kissed fiercely and he slid an extra pillow under John’s head. Then he straddled John, knees pressed against his raised arms, and leaned forward until he was gripping John’s wrists where they were fixed against the headboard. That hold alone sent John spinning in beautiful ways.

Gently, Rodney eased forward, and John caught Rodney’s cock in his mouth, licking the pre-come from its head with a delicious moan. Then he began to suck in earnest, trying to encourage Rodney’s gentle thrusts to go deeper. Before long, he had Rodney thrusting all the way to the hilt and he was swallowing round him, breathing in time to the thrusts. They knew each other to perfection and it was never too much for him. Rodney pushing into his throat, his own head rested on the pillow letting his lover just take him had him so hot he could feel himself hard and aching again. He began to moan and Rodney whimpered.

‘Oh god, John, so good, so, so good,’ and one of his hands loosened its grip to come back and cup his face as the thrusts grew more erratic and his breaths grew ragged. And then Rodney was coming down his throat and fucking hell if John didn’t come right along with him.

Rodney lifted off him straight away but knew better than to untie him too soon. John hated being untethered and needed time to ground before it happened. Rodney twined himself against John, running his hands over him, murmuring his love and awe. When he found the come on John’s stomach he was lost for words.

‘I know right?’ John smirked. ‘That hasn’t happened in a while.’

‘You amaze me,’ Rodney said. ‘I think I may be the luckiest man in two galaxies.’

‘Nah, that’s me,’ said John, realising he was giving Rodney the goofiest grin but what the hell. How did they get to come to a galaxy full of life-sucking space vampires, watch their own planet going to shit and yet end up so damn happy?

John kissed Rodney again and wriggled in his restraints.

‘Ready to come back down?’ Rodney waited for a nod before unbuckling each of the cuffs and massaging John’s wrists and ankles.

‘Shower,’ said John, ‘then let’s go find Ronon and the kids. Bet they’re in the park.’

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5, Northern Midsummer + 98**

**[Earth date: January 1st, 2021]**

**Location:** **Atlantis**

‘Just let me die,’ Rodney groaned.

‘Nope, you’re getting no sympathy from me, boozing on a schoolnight.’ John knew his gentle fingers in Rodney’s hair somewhat belied the harshness in his voice. He’d managed to get some glucose water down Rodney earlier to ward of a hypoglycaemic attack, there was not much more he could do for his suffering lover.

‘S’New Year. S’tradition.’ Rodney pressed into John’s hand.

‘Yeah, Hogmany is kinda irrelevant in Pegasus and celebrated by pretty much just you and Carson. And the giving yourselves alcohol poisoning thing is getting as old as you.’ John tutted. Rodney never could handle his drink and taking possibly the last remaining bottle of scotch in Pegasus round to Carson’s had made his condition this morning a forgone conclusion.

‘Ssssh, don’t tut so loudly!’ Rodney whined. ‘Anyway, it was the fish paté that made me ill.’ he protested weakly.

‘Sure it was, McKay.’ John ruffled Rodney’s wavy locks affectionately, and then slid his hand down to massage Rodney’s neck.

‘That’s nice.’ Rodney pressed into his touch and burrowed further under the covers.

John gave up trying to rouse Rodney and pinged a message to Radek to let him know he’d be late to work. Ronon had taken Selin to school, so John settled in to work through his emails propped up next to his now snoozing husband. He had answered all the urgent stuff and was scanning a message from Jeannie when Rodney surfaced again. Although they were physically cut off from Earth, data transfer was still possible – slow as hell, but possible, and Jeannie’s updates were one small bit of connection to Earth that they both craved.

Communication with Dave was barely surviving their profound political differences, alas. The changing political landscape in America was suiting billionaire Dave too much for him to speak out, and John was getting more militant about injustice, not less, as he aged. They hadn’t fallen out, exactly, but they struggled to see eye to eye, and John saw more of Patrick in Dave every time they communicated.

‘Huh,’ said John, as he read the scanned article Jeannie had sent.

‘What you reading?’ Rodney uncovered his face, looking a little less green, but still groaned when he tried to move.

‘Oh, it’s a random article Jeannie thought I’d like. You wouldn’t approve – soft science. You’d probably call it “voodoo” or some other inappropriate and racist put-down.’

‘Hey, I would not! Well, not anymore. People can evolve, you know. I mean, not my opinion of soft sciences, obviously, but I would find a less racist way of attacking them these days. Maybe “woo” is a better term?’

‘Sure, McKay, you’re all progressive and shit,’ John dropped a kiss on Rodney’s forehead with a smirk. Then he focussed back on the article.

‘Damn it, what does it say and why did she send it to you, not me?’ Rodney ineffectually tried to pull John’s tablet towards him, but John just raised it out of reach.

‘You really wanna know? It says you and I are mutants.’

‘Well, that’s just rude.’

‘I mean, cool mutants. Like . . . X-men mutants. Well, sorta,’ John clarified.

‘So not just woo science, fantasy woo science.’

‘Ok, I’m so not telling you any more.’ John carried on reading in silence.

‘But, but, I’m lying here unable to open my eyes and . . .’

‘And?’ John grinned.

‘And I want to know what it says,’ Rodney admitted with resignation.

‘Well, it’s sort of what you already told me years ago – about you and me belonging to a subset of humans that have a bunch of divergent traits. Like my ADHD, bendy joints, sensory issues, freaky number synaesthesia and shit like that. And all the queerness, obviously. Your genius, autism, ambidexterity, medical bizarreness . . .’

‘Hey, rude.’ Rodney snorted. ‘So what about it?’

‘There’s now a theory. That we’re nature’s way of diversifying and pushing the species forward. Our differences are somewhat random but combine to push humanity in new directions. Like I said, we’re mutants.’

‘Oh. Uh, that actually makes sense,’ Rodney seemed genuinely interested.

John went on carefully, because there was something here he wanted to broach but they didn’t really talk about it. ‘So, um, there’s a whole bunch of trans and non-binary people in this divergent population cluster, and those folks have all sorts of other divergences – from medical conditions like Ehlers Danlos Syndrome, through autism but also unusual patterns of creativity and intelligence. There’s this one case study here of an agender kid who has thirteen separate diagnoses, IQ off the scale and is an exceptionally creative polymath.’

Rodney looked thoughtful for a minute. ‘That, er, . . . sounds a bit like me.’

‘That’s what I thought’, John replied, holding his breath.

But Rodney just groaned again. ‘Bathroom,’ he said, struggling upright unsteadily, and the moment was gone.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5 Southern Spring Equinox +61**

**[Earth date: March 15 th, 2021]**

**Location:** **Atlantis**

‘So, there’s a new group of refugees in the city,’ Ronon broached as John served up dinner for the three of them. ‘They’re short on everything, only have the clothes they stand up in.’ He met John’s eyes with firmness but compassion. John went silent for a long time at the news, knowing full well what he was being asked.

‘Okay,’ he said finally. ‘Yes, I guess it’s time.’ John slumped down into his chair and viewed his food with disinterest.

Selin looked from Ronon to John and back again. ‘What?’ she asked, not comprehending, and then John saw realisation settle into her face, quickly followed by that hot rage that was becoming quite familiar.

‘No!’ She slammed her fists down on the table, upsetting her cup of water. John knew enough to leave her to clear up her own messes once she calmed down, he just sat there and breathed.

‘Kiddo, it’s as much your choice as it is mine. But those folks need the clothes and Rodney would have wanted . . .’

‘He would have said “I’m far too selfish to give my clothes away to strangers” and you fucking well know it!’ Selin screamed at him. John winced at how quickly she’d picked up on his favourite swear word. He thought he’s been careful not to swear around her, but apparently not so much. He could hardly tell her off for it.

Her impersonation of Rodney had been so on the nail it hurt.

‘Yeah, he would have said that,’ John agreed, almost smiling to think of Rodney saying exactly that. ‘And then he would have quietly bagged up all the things he didn’t need anymore and maybe some of the things that weren’t his absolute favourites too. Because your Pa was much, much kinder than he pretended to be.’

Selin crumpled at this, the tears rolling down her cheeks. She ineffectively dabbed at the puddle of water on the table with her cloth napkin, ignoring the streams coming from her eyes. Ronon passed her a larger towel and gripped her shoulder. After a while, when her tears had slowly subsided, he said;

‘Hey, I bet there are things of yours that don’t fit anymore too, wanna help me pick them out to give to the refugee kids? You can have final say on Pa’s things once Da’s sorted through them. We’ll definitely save some of his favourite Lantean suits for you.’

Ronon looked across at John as if trying to gauge whether internally John was as thrown by his suggestion as Selin was, but he seemed satisfied with what he saw, and got up to follow Selin into her room. As he reached the door, he turned, looking thoughtful.

‘Can’t recall the last time I saw Rodney in Earther clothes.’ He met John’s gaze and held it awhile. Eventually, John shrugged it away, staring down at the soggy table, lost in thought.

When was the last time he had seen Rodney in Earth clothes, and why didn’t they ever talk about what was going on with Rodney and gender? Sure, both of them had long ago left behind some of the more toxic ideas from their culture about what makes a man, but there was something more going on with Rodney. It wasn’t about clothes, and it wasn’t about roles or rules or anything so basic.

It broke John’s heart to know it was something they had never managed to talk about, although the hints and clues had been everywhere.

He got up from the table and picked up a couple of empty grain sacks, taking them into the bedroom. Going to Rodney’s closet, he pulled out all his Earth clothes with an oddly disconnected feeling. Letting these go was easy, because they did not signify Rodney any more, they reminded him maybe of a guy he knew long ago, who was abrasive and arrogant and blew up most of a solar system and never talked about his feelings. He had loved that man, sure, but that man was as much of a stranger as Lt Col John Sheppard was a stranger to Dr John Sheppard, Deputy Governor of Atlantis, openly gay father, citizen of the Pegasus galaxy.

Actually, those two guys, the old John and Rodney, were kinda jerks and he didn’t miss either of them. Didn’t miss the bullshit effort they made to fit in with what it means to be a man in North American culture, either.

But no matter how much he rejected all that, John still very much saw himself as a man, and he wondered if he’d ever dared to ask Rodney the same question whether his answer would have been different.

He finished bagging up the Earth clothes. Then he reached for a hanger holding one of Rodney’s Lantean suits. As he disturbed the fabric, the scent of Rodney hit him so hard it pulled the legs from under him. His chest knotted. Sinking down against the dresser, he pulled the suit against his face, inhaling Rodney’s lingering scent deeply.

_God, Rodney. Need you here so bad._

He found himself clinging to the empty suit and he couldn’t bring himself to let go.

A long time later, Ronon and Selin found him there on the floor, hunched around the suit. Selin dropped to his side and flung her arms around him, burrowing into the smell of Rodney just like John was doing. Ronon slid down behind her, looping one arm around John’s shoulders and stroking Selin’s hair with the other.

Nothing was said. They huddled together and let the ache of missing Rodney just be there for a while.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5, Northern Midsummer + 108**

**[Earth date: January 9 th, 2021]**

**Location:** **Atlantis**

Rodney looked particularly gorgeous today, John decided. He was wearing one of the unisex Lantean-style tunics and pants that were peculiar to Atlantis but not completely unlike Priya’s plainer Punjabi suits, or an Indian man’s _salwar kameez_. In fact, Lantean fashion was heavily influenced by the fusion of certain Pegasus styles and the large influx of Indian personnel when the UN took over. The suit Rodney had on today was dusty blue, a colour John loved seeing him in, and not just because it reflected his eyes.

‘I’m a citizen of Atlantis – I’m from _here._ It matters,’ Rodney had insisted long ago when he first adopted this garb, but John knew there was more to it than that.

They didn’t make Lantean suits in black, so that was that for John. His Earth clothes were, however, going to fray eventually and his apparel was beginning to stand out here.

They were all up in the control room, waiting for Rodney to dial. John went over to Jara, who looked rather nervous and pale.

‘Come on, Jara, quit worrying, you’ve done an amazing job. I’ve never seen anyone so thorough.’

The pale red-headed woman gave him a thin smile. John had been so impressed with her, the way she had spent hours on site, checking every detail, her meticulous planning. She had been working for Priya for four years now and though they had not much been in contact, John had come to trust her as much as Priya did. He was even considering stealing her for Atlantis.

‘So, are you ready to go? Priya, Chanis, Jara and Rodney were the only delegates to be dialled straight to the planet where the conference was happening. Jalik was a long-abandoned world with remaining facilities that had been polished up for the purpose of the summit. Other delegates were transferring via an intermediary planet, where they would go through Jara’s rigorous scanning and security process. Nobody knew the location of the conference except the four Lantean delegates and Teyla, John and Radek who were currently the only people in the control room.

John moved in and squeezed Rodney’s arm. As always when meeting new people Rodney was struggling with his anxiety. ‘Good luck. Seduce them with your brilliance, and you’ll have the whole galaxy at your feet, begging for your ZPMs.’ He grinned, but Rodney gave a shudder.

‘Are we ever going to be done meddling, do you think? And who’s this for, exactly?’ An old frown was re-establishing itself on Rodney’s brow, and John couldn’t help but smooth it away with his thumb. He had nothing to say to allay Rodney’s fears, and they had had the conversation to death anyhow. This was the right thing to do, and yet having this much influence on so many lives was terrifying, especially given the mistakes in their past.

Rodney flashed a brief smile at John and set to dialling. The wormhole established, Radek passed the ZPM case to Rodney, and soon they were stepping through the wormhole.

Seconds after they were gone, the wormhole cut out before they had the chance to disengage it.

‘That was weird,’ John felt the hairs rise all over his body. ‘Radek, wanna check that out?’

He found himself concentrating on keeping his breathing level, unsure if he really wanted to breathe at all.

Radek moved back up to the control room. John and Teyla followed. Radek redialled the site, but it did not connect, and John’s anxiety turned into cold panic. Radek muttered in Czech for a moment as he perused the computer, and then he seemed to crumple into the seat and sank his head into his hands.

‘Radek, what is it?’ Teyla asked, but John was already there joining up the dots and his insides were liquefying.

‘EM pulse. There has been an explosion. Oh god, god, they are gone.’ And then the little Czech was crying and trying not to look into the faces of his friends.

John found he couldn’t stay on his feet. He would never have figured an ex-military guy like him could be knocked off his feet just with words, but there it was. Teyla sank down beside him, pulling him against her but he barely noticed.

An hour later when the _UNSC Kilimanjaro_ came into orbit, they hadn’t moved. Radek had not stopped sobbing, and John’s only real thought was to wonder why his own tears were so pointlessly silent.

There had been no point in the _Kilimanjaro_ remaining in orbit once they scanned for hostiles and found nothing. The explosion had taken out the stargate and with it all life on the planet, including around 200 delegates and Priya, Rodney, Jara and Chanis. The science officer on the _Kilimanjaro_ had taken the time to scan for energy signatures and spotted the tell-tale pattern of a Genii nuke almost immediately.

Jara’s suicide note was timed to appear in John and Teyla’s inbox after the explosion. It was earnest, passionate, full of conviction that she was doing right by the people of Pegasus to prevent Earth meddling further in its affairs. Rodney would probably have agreed with a lot of her sentiments, if not her methods. She had of course planted the bomb and detonator during her diligent security preparations, with the assistance of what she named the _Free Pegasus Alliance._ It was doubtful she knew her people were bankrolled by the Genii.

John knew that, for the rest of his life, he was going to hate himself for that last conversation he had with Jara, for not reading her nervousness correctly or seeing in her eyes that she was about to commit this atrocity.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5, Northern Midsummer + 108**

**[Earth date: January 9 th, 2021] **

**Location:** **In orbit over Jalik**

‘What the ever-loving fuck just happened?’ Rodney had felt the familiar weightless feeling of beaming technology grabbing him and then instead of being on Jalik, he, Priya and Chanis had materialised on what, from the familiar vibration around them, was clearly a spaceship, and one of Earth design.

No Jara. So, that was suspicious. Well, being on a spaceship was suspicious. More than suspicious, really.

There was a bright flash through a tiny convex porthole a few feet away. Chanis made it there first, and their dark face seemed to lose all the blood from it, then Priya looked.

‘Oh god.’ Her own face became stricken.

In the fraction of a second it took Rodney to get there they were already in hyperspace, so he learned of the destruction of Jalik from Priya and Chanis. And broke the news to them that given the EM pulse from the massive explosion of the stargate and presumably the nuke that ignited it, the _Kilimanjaro_ would not have picked up the presence of their ship before it slipped away. He doubted even he would have picked up its presence. They would simply be counted among the dead.

More immediate than a sense of his own peril was the tight band around Rodney’s heart at the thought of John and Selin’s grief. It was almost too much to bear.

It took less than seconds for them to conclude that Jaya was responsible for this atrocity. Rodney had never seen Priya defeated, but the haunted look her face bore now came close. She had trusted Jaya with everything, and now hundreds were dead and plans for the technological liberation of an entire galaxy were in tatters.

The men who came to fetch him were Genii. Though the ship they were on was clearly of Earth design, there was no sign of the true masterminds of this operation. They relieved Rodney of the ZedPM, took him to a cargo hold, stripped him, and put him in chains. Last time he had restrained by captors John had been next to him, making quips about bondage and making it all seem somehow surmountable.

Now, he was alone, and he just had the overwhelming sense he was supposed to do, say or think something to prevent these men having power over him, but he had nothing.

With a scanner on one hand and a knife in the other, one of the men tracked Rodney’s subcu’ transmitter and carelessly cut it out, leaving him bleeding and trying not to sob and plead. He knew that would be bad, but he wasn’t really built for stoicism or not expressing whatever he was thinking or feeling. His head was getting hot with trying to remember what John had taught him about enduring captivity. It had been a long time since he’d been captured, and he’d never been very good at it.

_McKay, you don’t have to be good at this, it’s not a test. Just breathe until rescue comes. That’s all you have to do, Rodney, just breathe. This isn’t something you can get wrong or right._

Rodney remembered John’s words to him from a long time ago, when angry natives with bows and arrows had them suspended in wooden cages.

He had another transmitter, newer and less detectable, that they didn’t find, but it wasn’t any use if nobody was looking for him. And nobody was ever going to look for him, he knew that with utter certainty.

_Just breathe until rescue comes._

Only rescue isn’t coming.

 _Just breathe, then,_ John’s voice answered with its usual, casual drawl.

They never talked to him, just laughed and joked and sneered with each other while they beat and tortured him. Then left him alone, without food and water, for what seemed like an eternity. He passed through the migraines, nausea and confusion of hypoglycaemia and lost days to it, discovering the unending agony of his body without sustenance.

He was almost pleased to see them again when they came, even though they brought more pain with them. There was a strange kind of intimacy in being beaten, and in an odd way it stopped hurting after a while, or at least stopped hurting _more._

John had talked to him about torture years ago, and the conversation slowly came back to him during his hours of torment. It was before they’d ever fucked – after Kolya and that knife during the storm. Told him the ways to cope, the places to go in his mind, but also told him that everyone breaks and resisting torture was a myth in the end. After days of this, Rodney was ready to do or say anything, and John’s voice in his head reassured him.

_Everyone breaks, Rodney. It’s okay. Just survive._

But these men were not asking anything of him, and Rodney soon learned it was pointless to ask anything of them. So he stopped even begging for mercy, simply took it, long after he thought he couldn’t bear anymore. There was nothing else to do.

After a few days they added sound torture, and he knew it was designed uniquely for him, for someone autistic who was sound-sensitive. So, they had good intel and knew exactly how to hurt him. Whenever he was alone, they played noise into the room – chattering overlaid voices, ticking, hammering, hissing; a constant, relentless, ever-changing stream of noise intrusion that drilled into his skull until he smashed his hands against his head to make it stop. But it never did.

He had no hope, and that was a first. Whenever he had been captured, despite his fear and pessimism there had always been a kernel of hope. His team would come for him. _John_ would come. The only time he hadn’t believed that, he had overdosed on wraith enzyme to rescue himself. Here, there was no rescuing himself, and no being rescued. John wouldn’t come because Rodney’s death had been brilliantly faked along with the deaths of so many others who died for real.

There was nothing to do, nothing to believe. All he could do was endure while they beat him and messed with his head and half-starved him until there was nothing left of the person he was before.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5 Southern Spring Equinox +6**

**[Earth date: January 30 th, 2021] **

**Location:** **Belkan**

Teyla longed to have Priya by her side right now. It was almost as profound as the perpetual ache for Rodney, which was like losing a part of herself, someone closer than a brother. But Priya would know what to do, how to salvage this.

John had not wanted to let her go out into the galaxy and meet the peoples that had lost delegates, but what else could she do? The risk had to be hers, not theirs, and these unplanned arrivals on various worlds were beginning to soothe the anger the terror attack had generated. Presenting evidence of Genii manipulation helped things along too – nobody believed the Genii were interested in a “Free Pegasus” and it was transparent that Jara had been used.

When people realised Teyla was giving out ZPMs, they were even more inclined to listen. And when it was clear the only strings they came with were around who legally owned the modules and their output, folk started to trust that this was not the same story as when the Earthers had first come to the galaxy and started their high-handed meddling.

It helped, in the end, that it was Teyla, and folk trusted Teyla not just to be a mouthpiece for the Earthers. She had a galaxy-wide reputation for integrity and honesty.

But she was just so _tired._ At home her deputy, John, was barely functioning, doing his job as if sleepwalking. She really needed to put him on leave, but she wasn’t sure if she would manage without him. And here she was away from Lantea when there were still a hundred ways she was needed back home. Needed by her people (the Athosians) needed by her people (the Lanteans) needed by her people (the whole galaxy) needed by her people (Kanaan, Torren and Charyn) needed by her people (John, Ronon and Selin). She wished it was arrogance to think this way, but it was not, it was simply the truth. She found herself in an impossible position, every bit as drained as the demo ZPM she took with her off-world to explain the technology.

She would never have thought that losing either Priya or Rodney would be the things that broke her when she had lost so much in her life, but it was getting to be a close thing.

That night, she knew what she needed to do. She told Kanaan she would not be home, and headed for Ronon’s quarters, but he was not there. She hesitated at the door of John’s, but then sent Ronon a text.

_Where are you? I could do with company._

Just a few heartbeats, and a text came back. _Been staying with John and Selin. Join us if you want._

Yes. That was what she wanted, to be with her team, or what was left of it. Because John didn’t need to not be broken to give her comfort. Ronon didn’t need to be distracted from caring for John and Selin to give her care too. This wasn’t a zero-sum game.

She rang the chime. Ronon answered the door, pulling her against him for a long while, then led her into the bedroom. Selin was asleep, cuddled up against John. John was awake, his eyes bleak and lost, but he looked at Teyla and reached out a hand, pulling her against him on the other side. Ronon sandwiched her between them, and for the first time in days she realised she wasn’t alone.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5 Southern Spring Equinox +18**

**[Earth date: February 10 th, 2021] **

**Location: Unknown**

So much time had passed it had become meaningless. Rodney was reduced to nothing, just a slowed-down body that knew how to take pain and how to find meagre rest on a hard floor in the discomfort of chains. Even with a constant bombardment of noise playing with his mind day and night. He had been barely fed just a handful of times, and his bones were beginning to stick out, his muscles wasting. John wouldn’t think he was so hot anymore.

Except he was never going to see John again. A thought that was bitter in its certainty. He didn’t know what was worse, the grief he felt at losing John and Selin, the grief he felt at what they would be going through, or the fury he felt that they didn’t know he was _right here_ and desperately in need of rescue.

He was filthy, and bloody and bony and weak and there really wasn’t that much left of him anyway. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had an intelligent thought. This wasn’t life.

And then, _she_ came.

She was an Earther. Beautiful, classy, with a high-end American accent. Bobbed blond hair, subtle make-up, designer pants suit. She appeared with the Genii guards and did a top-notch impersonation of someone being concerned and outraged.

‘What have you done to him, you monsters!’

She came to Rodney’s side, touched his arm gently. ‘Oh, Dr McKay, I am so sorry. Let me get you out of here.’ Then turning to the Genii, ‘unlock him, quick, and find his clothes for god’s sake!’

Rodney was still smart enough to work out that this was the person to _really_ be afraid of.

A blanket appeared from somewhere and was thrown around his shoulders. It felt so good, and he thought it was a nice touch, the way she tucked it around him, comforting, motherly. So obviously _planned._

He was beamed to a facility that could have been anywhere in two galaxies. They took him to a doctor, let him have a bath, gave his clothes back (the fact that they had been laundered was a good indication of how premeditated this all was), and all the while the woman was simpering about how they would never work with those brutes the Genii again, as if they hadn’t paid those brutes the Genii to work him over.

God, they must think he was really stupid.

And yet as he tucked into his first proper meal for what had transpired to be a whole month in Earth time (don’t eat too much too soon, the doctor had said, your body won’t take it), he started to notice things. Noticed he was pathetically grateful to this woman even though she was a liar and he hated her. Noticed he was keeping all his snark on the inside and being careful and oh god _nice_ to her and the doctor.

And that was when it sank in how effectively they had broken him; how compliant he had become in the face of this phony kindness.

After a sleep in a luxuriously comfortable bed he poked around the accommodation they had given him. It was a fancy, penthouse-style apartment, with modern, North-western Earth aesthetics. No windows. There was a kitchen stocked with everything he could want or even fantasise about eating after a month of scraps.

The first thing he looked for was something with citrus in. Anaphylactic shock would be a nice, easy way to escape this shit. But they clearly had good intel; no citrus.

Well, there were other ways. He looked for a sharp knife, there were ways you could open a vein that were too quick to fix.

No knives, and the glassware and crockery were all plastic. Damn.

What about the classics? He went back into the bedroom and made a quick noose out of one of the sheets, then cast about for something to fix it to. At which point he realised that all the light fittings were recessed and the walls perfectly smooth. Maybe he could dig out the light fittings . . .

The door swished open and Blondie was standing there with two armed men behind her. She took the sheet from him and put it back onto the bed.

‘Oh Dr McKay, I know you’ve had a terrible ordeal, but it’s over. Everything is going to be okay from now on.’

He wanted to believe her, but it really wasn’t.

‘Why don’t I bring you to your friends? Priya and Chanis are anxious to see you.’ She took Rodney by the arm, and he found himself not resisting her. Outside his apartment was a grey corridor, and just down it was another door to an identical apartment. And there were Priya and Chanis, looking well fed and unhurt. Blondie left them alone.

‘Rodney! Oh my god, what did they do to you?’ Priya held him gently and Rodney thought he might cry. He was as suspicious of this, of Priya and her kindness, as he was of Blondie’s.

‘They didn’t hurt you?’ was all he managed.

‘No. We’re working on the assumption it’s you they were after, and we are just alive to assist your co-operation.’

Because even if they hadn’t already harmed Priya and Chanis, he now knew for certain they could.

They were going to make Rodney work for them. And was going to cooperate. He realised his fate was so inexorable it was pointless fighting. He sank into a ridiculously comfortable chair with tears in his eyes. Priya laid a hand on his shoulder. It didn’t make anything better, but it helped somehow. Chanis sat on the arm of the chair and leaned against him, and they just sat like that until Blondie came back.

‘I want to show you to your state-of-the-art lab, Dr McKay.’

‘Might as well get back to work I guess,’ Rodney said blankly.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5 Southern Spring Equinox +25**

**[Earth date: February 14 th, 2021]**

**Location:** **Atlantis**

Selin had made John a Valentine card, and he hugged and hugged her with tears rolling down both their cheeks, trying desperately not to think about how things had been just one Earth year ago. He didn’t much mark Earth time, but certain dates and festivals still got celebrated on the Earth calendar, and Rodney had been surprisingly romantic about Valentine’s.

This Valentine he would be greeting Jeannie and Madison, who were gating in from the UN Alpha site, and tomorrow they would hold Rodney’s memorial. Priya and Chanis’ had already happened. Priya would have a fuller memorial in England, where her ex-wife and family would be burying an empty casket. John knew there was still love between Priya and her ex despite their separation and this was going to be hard on Maeena. He wished he could be there, but no way was it safe to return to Earth just now.

Chanis’ memorial took place on Latira, with John and Teyla in attendance. In honour of Chanis’ sacrifice, Latira was getting the first ZPM.

Selin hadn’t even met Jeannie. Setting foot on Earth had for a while been increasingly risky for anyone with John and Rodney’s knowledge of Atlantis operations and the stargate program, and unsettling Selin had seemed unnecessary anyway, so they just hadn’t been back to Earth since adopting her. So now, Selin was meeting her aunt at the worst possible time and John ached for the relationship Selin and Jeannie should have had, not to mention the relationship with her 12-year-old cousin Bradley and 18-year-old Madison. For a moment, John hated Pegasus and wished he had never left Earth.

Except then he would never have had Selin and would probably never have met Rodney either.

They had told Madison about their sci-fi lives in the run-up to declassification that never happened, so she already knew her uncles worked in another galaxy, and that Wormhole X-treme was more fact than fiction. Nothing prepares you for gating into Atlantis, though, and sad as she was about Rodney, John could see the awe and wonder on Madison’s face when she stepped into the gateroom.

Damn, Rodney would have loved to see that look.

Jeannie ran into his arms and clung, and John clung back, then Madison, who was close to John’s height now, wrapped herself around both of them. Selin edged in and pulled John’s arm around her, because it was illegal for there to be a cuddle she wasn’t in on. Eventually, John broke the huddle and introduced his daughter. Selin looked at them with her brown eyes wide as if Jeannie and Madison were alien and exotic, and John supposed they were. Selin didn’t meet many real (non-Lantean) Earthers.

They went to a Satedan restaurant in the South City and ordered what John always thought of as kebabs (Rodney had once suggested that kebabs are a universal constant). As they consumed the flatbread-wrapped meat, coated in sweet, sticky sauce, Jeannie asked John to fill her in on the two years they had been apart. Mads was quiet, her big eyes taking in the world around her in a mixture of wonder and sadness. She had a practical, thoughtful face and was not unlike her mother or her uncle in both looks and the sharp intelligence that lay behind her eyes.

Selin watched John with curiosity as he had the odd task of telling this stranger all about how Selin had turned his and Rodney’s lives upside down, and how much they loved her for it.

After a long while, Jeannie looked carefully at Selin. ‘Mer – I mean, Rodney, wanted kids so much, honey,’ she said earnestly to the girl, ‘I can tell you really completed his life. It’s good to know he was so happy.’

But Selin just scrunched up her face at this and threw the rest of her food across the table, splattering sauce everywhere. She scrambled to her feet and fled. John ran after her, finding her clinging onto a railing overlooking one of the piers.

‘Don’t blame you for being angry, kiddo. It just plain hurts to think about losing something so damn good, huh?’ Selin’s knuckles whitened on the railing and her breath came in little gasps.

‘Maybe not now, but one day we’re going to be glad we made Rodney so happy. If you gotta go, you may as well go out smiling.’

She just gave him a hurt glare.

‘Right. Still stuck on why he had to go at all, huh? Me too.’ God, his chest hurt like a bastard. He slid up close to Selin and tilted his head against hers, not really knowing what more to say. They stared at the water for a while in silence.

Eventually, they found their way back to Jeannie and Mads. Selin murmured an apology to Jeannie and Mads for the sauce splatter, but Jeannie looked contrite.

‘I’m so sorry, honey. I don’t know why I’m trying to comfort you. It’s awful, and there’s no making it okay. For what it’s worth, I can’t bear it either, I was just clutching at straws. If I’d known I would never see him again, I . . .’ but then Jeannie was crying, and Mads was crying, and oddly both John and Selin relaxed, because _this_ they were used to.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5 Southern Spring Equinox +47**

**[Earth date: March 4 th, 2021] **

**Location: Unknown**

‘I think it’s time I rewarded your hard work,’ Blondie said as she came into Rodney’s secluded little basement lab. Rodney found himself outwardly responding like a puppy looking for treats, while inwardly he wondered what game was being played this time.

‘I’m going to give you some fresh air, Rodney, that’s all. Don’t look so worried!’

With three goons with semi-automatics in tow, they rode a secure elevator to the roof of the building. There was a relatively pretty roof garden with a spectacular view.

Aha, that’s her game. Rodney had spent the last week or so working out ways to use zero point energy to blow this place sky high, having given up on previous attempts at ways of communicating with the outside world through their staggeringly effective shielding.

Seeing the city sprawled around him stopped his explosive plans in their tracks. He could think of the greater good, but he knew he didn’t have it in him to effectively nuke what looked like . . . Chicago, maybe? He had thought they were on Earth, but supervillains were supposed to have their lairs up mountains or in extinct volcanoes, not in the centre of a busy city.

Of course, in the movies, the supervillains weren’t working for the US government, but he was pretty sure these folks were. Pretty sure they didn’t even have the excuse of being Goa’uld either. Just plain old power-hungry humans. In this case, the power they were hungry for was ZedPMs, and Rodney was running out of ways to slow his progress. As soon as they had the key to make the Ancient’s powerful energy modules, he, Chanis and Priya were as good as dead. So really, he may as well get dead before he gave them what they wanted – but how?

‘Can I stretch my legs?’

‘Of course.’ Blondie smiled that cold smile and Rodney wanted to punch her even as his own face collapsed into gratitude.

He tried to be subtle about it, but the guards watched him like a dog watches a sandwich. Any idea of taking himself over the edge quickly evaporated. Another escape route gone. Instead, he took a moment to smell the fresh, scented air and appreciate the light of Sol on his face. It had been a long, long time. Months since he had felt any sun at all, years since he’d been under Earth’s sun.

‘Maybe I can come here again?’ Rodney asked. Maybe he could lull them with his compliance, but that wasn’t working so far.

‘Of course,’ said Blondie with another cold smile.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5 Southern Spring Equinox +26**

**[Earth date: February 15 th, 2021]**

**Location:** **Atlantis**

John had stood through so many gateroom memorials and still carried the pain of all of them. You realise when you’ve lost a lot of people that you don’t “get over” stuff, it just recedes into a place in you that’s always there, just less visible. He had no idea when that would happen with Rodney, because right now the grief was consuming him. Sure, so many losses had chipped chunks off him and left him on the floor. But this, this pulverised his heart and then smashed it a second time on Selin’s behalf. He had never known pain like it.

Jeannie stood by him, and he was glad of her. Teyla was talking about her coming to work in Atlantis and Jeannie was considering this. Canada was a little close to the US to be a comfortable place to live right now and in a radical turnabout of events, Atlantis was far the safer place to be. Mads seemed excited about the prospect of studying at the cutting edge of science and technology, now she was completing high school. It would be good for Selin to have them here. Good for John too, even if he saw Rodney in Jeannie’s face every time he looked at her.

He looked around the room and saw how much love was there, and remembered the awkward, abrasive guy who came to Atlantis, all edges and snark, not knowing how to fit in anywhere, not speaking to his sister, his only friend the cat he left back on earth.

And here was Jeannie crossing two galaxies to say goodbye to a much-loved brother. Here was a husband and daughter grieving for their beloved. Here were good friends who were going to truly miss the unique being that was Rodney McKay. And here was an entire galaxy on the brink of a clean energy revolution because of him.

Suddenly John was simply grateful for Rodney ever having existed – his brilliance, his bravery, his tenacity, but most of all his ability to grow. He had an amazing 52 years, and John was grateful for every moment they had had.

So when he helped Selin and Jeannie and Mads carry a wreath to the open wormhole, for the first time when he thought about Rodney, his eyes were dry and his chest didn’t hurt.

And then he looked down at his daughter’s tears and all that clarity didn’t matter a damn, he just wanted Rodney back. The tears and the pain came again like a wave. But there wasn’t a person in the gateroom that day whose eyes stayed dry.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5 Southern Spring Equinox +48**

**[Earth date: March 5 th, 2021]**

**Location:** **Earth**

When Rodney got back to his apartment, the first thing he always did was change into his Lantean clothes from the Earth clothes they had given him. It seemed such a small thing to be uncomfortable about, next to everything else that was happening, and yet the Earth clothes made him want to crawl out of his skin.

Maybe he could talk about it, it wasn’t like with all the surveillance he could talk about their predicament, or his work, or his ongoing thoughts about ways in which he could off himself before giving their captors what they wanted and getting them all killed anyway.

Chanis and Priya were always waiting for him when he got home, which was at exactly eight every evening, enforced by his captors. They handed him a beer and he got changed, same as every evening.

He was glad they were here. Not for them, because it meant their imminent deaths, but he liked their company. He’d always loved Priya, and Chanis was worming their way in just as close. It didn’t make up at all for missing John and Selin and even Ronon and Teyla, but it was something.

He came out in his Lantean suit and sighed.

‘That’s better. I can’t bear Earth clothes any more, they’re just . . .’

Priya and Chanis looked at him, waiting for him to finish his sentence, but he didn’t know how to.

When he didn’t say anything for a while, Priya asked gently, ‘Is it that they’re _Earth_ clothes, or _men’s_ clothes?

Damn, but it was uncomfortable being _seen._

‘Er . . . the latter. I, I don’t know how to say it, I just don’t feel I fit in the box they put me in.’

‘I think you probably _can_ say that to me, Rodney,’ Chanis said.

‘But that’s it, Chanis, I can’t!’ He could feel his voice rising and his emotions dysregulating. He felt himself on the verge of a meltdown. ‘I mean, you’re so androgynous nobody puts you in a box. Me, I’m a deep-voiced, hairy, bulky dude and thinking anything else is just ridiculous.’

‘I don’t know what you’re saying, Rodney. On Latira, we have hairy, muscly deep-voiced women and soft-spoken, hairless, fine-featured men and just about anything in between. People are what they are, and everyone’s different.’

Priya chimed in. ‘And you know in India, too we have a legal third gender and before the British came and fucked things up we celebrated the natural diversity of sex and gender.’

Rodney looked at them both for a minute and then shook his head. ‘This is a pointless conversation. I’ll be dead soon and none of this will matter and anyway I’m from _Canada_ , not India or Latira and in Canada men wear pants and shirts and get called he and that’s just how it is.’ Why was he even talking about this? How did it even matter? Atlantis and Lantean suits and the tiny bit of breathing room they gave him was over. It was all over.

He ached for John right now so much it crushed him. For all the things he had never got around to exploring when there really had been time, with the one person who seemed to take everything about him in his stride.

‘Except, Rodney, in Canada they legally recognise non-binary people, because being non-binary is a real thing, even in Canada.’ Priya said this gently, but firmly.

‘Non-binary?’ Chanis asked.

‘It’s the word English speakers use, what we call third gender in India. Indigenous Canadians would say _Two Spirit_ , although neither of those terms translates perfectly to non-binary. You Latirans simply say _both_ , which I rather like,’ Priya answered.

‘Oh, _both_ \- like me and Rodney,’ Chanis said, and something about being included in that statement made Rodney want to cry hard.

Maybe, he thought later, it mattered _because_ he was going to die. Perhaps there were some things he needed to accept about himself before it was too late. And after all, what did he really have left to lose?

The next day when he got home, Rodney found bags full of women’s clothes and make-up in his room, which he unceremoniously dumped into the garbage.

‘I’m not a trans woman, you stupid fucks!’ He shouted into the ether.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5 Southern Spring Equinox +51**

**[Earth date: March 7 th, 2021]**

**Location:** **Atlantis**

Teyla was frustrated. She didn’t just want to leave the Genii unaccountable, and yet two months after the attack on Jalik, her intelligence was still too poor for her to take any action. She and John had agreed early on that despite the evidence the weapon was Genii in design, a retaliatory strike would not be helpful. This was true for many reasons, the first and most obvious being that attacking a country with vastly inferior weaponry was not a good way to sell the idea that the UN and Atlantis wanted to work alongside the rest of the galaxy, not dominate them.

She had expected John to fight her, but he hadn’t. Just one of many signs of the positive ways in which John had grown, from the hot-headed flyboy she had once known to the wise and reflective man she knew today.

But Teyla wanted names, wanted to know who was responsible, so they could seek justice through diplomacy and law. But all her intelligence operatives were coming up empty. She knew there had been yet another Genii regime change recently, and she suspected the attack was a trigger for this, but concrete details were elusive.

They did not need bombs and a show of power, they needed the truth out there under a harsh spotlight.

She sent out more intelligence gatherers to planets where the Genii traded and spied, but she felt tired and hopeless. It was beginning to look like they would get away with two hundred and seven murders, including two of her dearest friends. She knew there was something she was missing, but was beginning to think the truth would never come to light.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5 Southern Spring Equinox +53**

**[Earth date: March 9 th, 2021]**

**Location:** **Earth**

Rodney came back from the lab aching with defeat and fatigue. He was too clever to keep stalling for much longer. They already had enough to put ZedPMs within their grasp and before long he would be handing it to them on a plate. And then he guessed it would be a bullet to the brain and all this would be over. He had got used to the idea he was going to die but he could not come to terms with the fact his legacy would be putting more power into the hands of the rogue state that had once been the United States of America.

When he got back to the rooms Priya and Chanis were there to meet him, but they looked particularly shifty. He discovered the reason for this when he went into his room. There on the bed, laid out carefully, was a new Lantean suit. It had been made from soft blue-grey fabric that wouldn’t set off his sensory issues, sewn to the exact template of his original suit. Clearly hand-made, and imperfect, but that only added to the love that was stitched into the garment.

Suddenly Rodney felt a wave of warmth. Desperate as his situation was, miserable as he was without his husband and kid with him, there were still kind, brilliant people like this in the world and there were worse folks than Priya and Chanis to spend your last days alive with.

He went out into the lounge, modelling the suit. He gave Chanis and Priya a beaming smile and hugged them both tightly.

‘You’re too adorable,’ he said, and then, because it was the other thing on his mind, he dug for information; ‘how did you get the kit to do this?’

‘We’re so fucking bored, Rodney!’ Priya responded, ‘Neither of us can sew for fuck but we figured it out eventually. We persuaded them we could not make mischief with a sewing machine and a bit of kit to go with. They half agreed – it gets taken away at night so apparently, they think _you_ could make mischief with it. The hardest part was cutting out the fabric when they only gave us child scissors and a thread cutter.’

Priya wasn’t stupid, she would know that Rodney was hoping for a way to do damage to himself. Oh well. He let it go and returned to the subject of the suit.

‘It means a lot, you know. I feel like I can breathe in this, and I don’t just mean the roomy waistline.’ This suit hung over his frame a little as he had not yet regained the weight he lost when being tortured. His appetite just hadn’t returned, and he felt sick most days.

‘Rodney, is there anything else you need from us?’ Chanis’ brown eyes caught his with a level of intensity Rodney was by now used to. He understood the subtext, _we’re all gonna die so ask while you still can._

‘Well . . .’ Rodney hesitated. Why was it so hard to ask when he really had nothing left to lose?

‘What, Rodney? You know by now you can say anything to us.’

It was true. Maybe he would have grown close to anyone in this situation, but these two meant more to him than that, they were true friends. He loved them both.

‘Okay, so you know my first name isn’t Rodney, it’s Meredith?’

Priya knew this, but Chanis didn’t, and Priya had to explain that Meredith had evolved to be more a girl’s name than a boy’s, which Chanis didn’t fully understand, given all Latiran names were gender neutral.

‘Do you want us to call you Meredith?’ Chanis asked.

‘No, er . . . it’s too much the other way, but my sister calls me “Mer” and I thought . . .’

‘Okay, Mer, we can call you that if it makes you more comfortable,’ Chanis said solemnly, and Priya nodded in agreement.

It felt like little threads of anxiety untangling themselves in his chest, or something coming into alignment like iron filings in a magnetic field. How did a name make so much difference? And why had he fought so hard against his own name when it fitted him so well?

‘It feels right, you calling me Mer,’ ~~Rodney~~ Mer admitted. ‘I can’t explain why.’

‘You don’t have to,’ Chanis squeezed his arm. Mer was grateful that Chanis understood, despite their bewilderment over Earthers’ inhibitions around gender diversity. Latirans took the approach of “shrug, that’s just how folks are” and got on with it without a fuss.

‘Mer, there’s one thing I’d like to ask, if I may?’ Priya looked hesitant.

Mer nodded, feeling a little apprehensive about personal questions.

‘What pronouns should I use for you?’

‘Oh! Oh.’ He really hadn’t thought about this. Chanis’ pronoun in English was “they” and Mer realised he had quite a lot of feelings about that. Not being shoved into a box every time someone spoke about him was powerfully appealing.

‘Er, could we maybe try they/them, like for Chanis?’ ~~He~~ they said finally.

‘Sure we can,’ said Priya, ‘Chanis, I think you better get Mer a beer, it looks like they could do with one.’

It was that easy, and Mer would never be able to explain why it meant so damned much, but it really did.

Once they all had beers in hand, Priya raised a toast.

‘To Mer! Congratulations on your gender transition.’

Mer nearly spat their beer out. _Huh. I guess that makes me trans. Sort of. Wow._

Some things were worth figuring out quickly because Mer estimated they had at most ten days left alive, and if the plan that was bubbling up in their brain worked as hoped, maybe less.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5 Southern Spring Equinox +63**

**[Earth date: March 17 th, 2021]**

**Location:** **Atlantis**

In the end, the Genii came to the Atlanteans

Teyla was hesitant about John being at the meeting, but John insisted, and promised to keep a lid on his feelings. The Genii representatives were met by security on a neutral planet and were scanned thoroughly before being gated, blindfold, back to Atlantis.

Who should one of the representatives be but their old friend Ladon Radim. The former Genii leader had aged considerably since John had last seen him, and his face bore scars that looked like they’d been inflicted purposefully. The intervening years had not been kind, but now he looked comfortable, well fed, and in control.

‘First of all, I need you to know I and my aides had nothing to do with the terrorist atrocity on Jalik.’ Ladon informed them once they’d taken their places round the conference table.

‘You never do, do you?’ John drawled sarcastically. He felt sarcasm was almost friendly compared to the murderous beating he wanted to be handing out. But Teyla put her hand on his arm gently.

‘Our intelligence tells us you have been out of power for some time, and only recently were made leader once again, so I am inclined to believe your story. And if you act in good faith now, as promised we will consider the Genii’s request for a ZPM.’

John shifted in his seat at this but said nothing.

‘And what else does your intelligence tell you?’ Ladon asked.

‘We are piecing it together,’ Teyla answered noncommittally. ‘Would you fill in the blanks? Maybe tell us about Dalon Kolya.’

John started at the name – same surname as his nemesis, the man who had tortured him and Rodney on separate occasions.

‘Dalon Kolya was claiming he would make the Genii strong again,’ Ladon said. ‘Dalon is Acastus Kolya’s cousin, and has the same temperament, without the brains. He believed the atrocity would start a war that would turn the galaxy against Atlantis.’

Teyla nodded, looking unsurprised. It smarted that Teyla had information that she hadn’t shared, but John felt a measure of relief that they had read the situation right and not gone on the offensive. Time was he would have pushed hard for a military response to the attack, and he realised with a shock that they predicted _he_ would have the power to make that happen, and anticipated his response based on the old US Military Colonel, responding according to type, with a show of strength. The Genii really didn’t realise how much things had changed around here.

As if reading his thoughts, Teyla turned to him and said, ‘I’m sorry I had not yet briefed you, John. Although I admit that all this is not news to me, I have been waiting for some missing pieces to the puzzle. The biggest being, how Kolya thought he could possibly hold against Atlantis and the UN Space Corps.

‘That’s easy – because the US fleet is bigger,’ Ladon interjected.

‘WHAT?’ John jumped to his feet and began pacing, hardly believing what he had heard and yet at once knowing it to be true. Remembering back to last summer when Cam and Evan defected, and his cold realisation that SGC would nuke what had been their own people. Nausea was rising inside him. Had his own people – Earthers, _Americans,_ been behind the attack? His hands tugged at his hair, and when he brought them back down he realised they were shaking. He didn’t know what to do with himself. Teyla stood up and came to him, smoothing her hands over his arms and gently pulling him back to his seat, maintaining a comforting hold on him. He felt like without it her might take off into space.

‘There was no “Free Pegasus Alliance” of course,’ Ladon continued, ‘but the Earthers have a good network of spies and agents out here – one that almost rivals those of the Genii. And much better than yours – you folks don’t have enough appetite for dirty business. It was Earthers who recruited Jara and connected her up with the weapon, which we fully admit was Genii in origin. And the Earthers made sure she timed things so they could beam out the scientist without anyone knowing.’ Ladon sat back, his look smug. He knew he had just given them a ZPM’s worth of intel.

John couldn’t breathe. Blood thundered in his head, and his hands gripped the table in front of him while he tried to reprocess everything he’d thought he knew for the last two months. He was doing battle with the surge of hope that rose up in him. The fear, anger and uncertainty were far stronger. An hour ago, he had been complacently accepting Rodney’s loss. Now, he realised _two months_ had slipped by in which Rodney had been in certain danger, but alive, at least to begin with. Anything could have happened to him by now, and that was somehow harder to deal with than the certainty of his loss.

He had left Rodney alone and in danger. In captivity from the kinds of people who thought nothing of nuking two hundred people and sending an entire planet to extinction to get what they want. He pulled himself back to his feet, resisting Teyla’s attempts to anchor him.

Teyla looked up at him. ‘John, go and make contact with our Earth operatives immediately. We need to gather intelligence as fast as possible. I will continue with this meeting. Please send Ronon in to join me. You have a green light to take any action you feel necessary on information you receive.’

Teyla knew him well. He needed to move, to act. Within twenty minutes, he was patched into their people on the UN Alpha site in the Milky Way, and they had direct contact via relay stations with operatives on Earth.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5 Southern Spring Equinox +63**

**[Earth date: March 17 th, 2021]**

**Location:** **Earth**

Well, today was the last day. Time to die. At least hopefully, because Dr M.R. McKay, PhD, PhD was thoroughly earning the title of genius this week and they were pretty sure they’d screwed SGC and scuppered the ZedPM research. Courtesy of an ingenious little virus inspired by, of all people, the wraith.

Mer started the day early, making pancakes for Priya and Chanis on the pretext of being ‘on the verge of completing the work.’ As soon as the data they sent to SGC late last night was uploaded, all hell would break loose (hopefully), and a bullet to the brain would be swiftly forthcoming (probably).

All Mer’s broken compliance had paid off. It turned out their captors were not watching Mer nearly closely enough by the end. That, and of course, Mer was being exceptionally sneaky. It felt good to have outwitted their captors, put one over on Blondie and honestly, just to be so fucking clever. Mer hadn’t really delighted in their own cleverness for a while, but they imagined they could be excused for doing so now.

Oh, John would get such a kick out of this, they thought sadly. But John would never know.

‘I just want to say to you both . . .’ Mer was tearing up just a little, here, ‘I want to say that you’re both amazing people, and you’ve made the worst of situations almost pleasurable.’

Chanis and Priya pulled Mer into a tight three-way embrace.

‘We love you too, Mer,’ Priya said, and Chanis murmured their agreement.

There was always one person in the lab, but more were stationed outside, the usual goons with machine guns. Mer couldn’t get away with much when Blondie was there, but other guards were easier to fool, and she had been around less in the last week, giving Mer a chance to create the virus. If nothing else, the virus would chew through all Mer’s ZedPM research, but with luck, it might strangle a few other systems too.

Today, alas, was a Blondie day. Mer wasn’t happy to realise she would likely be the one to end it.

Nearly an hour passed before Blondies’ phone rang.

_This is it._

Mer could hear the agitation in the voice at the other end, and watched the fury fill up Blondie’s face. ‘What did you do?’ she screamed, reaching for the gun she stupidly did not have ready.

But Mer wasn’t just a genius scientist. Mer had seen a lot of combat and had sparred regularly with Teyla, Ronon and Jinto for years. While Blondie was distracted by the call, Mer decided that maybe they weren’t just going to stand around waiting for Blondie to shoot. They hurtled across the room and slammed Blondie into the door. She was too good to drop her gun, but Mer had learned from John how to disarm someone, and it was over surprisingly quickly. Blondie was pinned against the only door into the room with a gun to her temple. The guards were hollering outside. They would have seen everything via the security feed.

‘Drop the gun, McKay!’

‘Back the fuck off or Blondie gets it!’

‘Not going anywhere. Hand yourself over, there’s no way out!’

‘No fucking way! You can come in if you like, give me the satisfaction of you having to come through her to get to me.’

‘Hold your fire!’ Blondie shouted, and for the first time Mer could see some emotion in that cold face. ‘We can negotiate this. Tell them what you want.’

Mer thought about this because honestly, there hadn’t been any thought about wanting something, just the instinct not to let Blondie put a bullet in their brain.

‘Release Chanis and Priya. Show me they’re free and safe. Then I’ll hand myself over. Long as it takes.’ A strange feeling washed through Mer. It was almost peaceful.

‘Do as he says!’ Blondie shouted.

And then there was nothing but murmuring in the corridor outside, followed by a long silence.

Mer backed away and leaned against the counter.

‘Get on your front, hands behind your head. I’m a really good shot, in case you were wondering.’ As soon as she was down, Mer locked the lab door.

‘I believe you. Look, Rodney . . . Mer . . .’

‘You don’t get to call me that,’ Mer said coldly. ‘You don’t get to call me anything. Just shut the fuck up. You had me tortured. You were about to kill me in cold blood. You’re _merciless._ There’s nothing I want more than to put a bullet in you.’

Thirty minutes passed without either of them speaking. Mer kept looking at the gun in their hand, with the surreal realisation that they finally had the means to end it.

 _I guess before the day is out, that’s still what I’m going to have to do._ The thought was resigned by now, the sadness kept at bay.

Eventually they heard running in the corridor outside, muffled shouts and thuds. Someone trying the locked door. Mer tensed. So, they were going to come in guns blazing rather than concede to Mer’s demand.

Their heart clenched at the thought that Priya and Chanis might already be dead.

‘Back the fuck off or I shoot her!’

‘Rodney?’

Mer froze, body stiffening as if it was impossible to believe the evidence of their own ears. But little sparks of joy were igniting everywhere under their skin.

‘John?’ It couldn’t be. It _couldn’t_ be.

‘It’s me, Rodney. And Zelenka, Mitchell and Lorne. And a bunch of stunned henchmen. You can come out, Rodney, we’ve got you.’ Oh god, that crack in John’s voice made it _real._ Mer had altogether forgotten how to breathe.

When Mer moved to unlock the door, sure enough, Blondie used the distraction to push herself up, but Mer was ready for her. Damn, but they wanted the excuse to shoot, but . . .

‘Stay the fuck down!’ They planted a foot in the small of her back and she dropped.

Mer unlocked the door, and there was John, all his focus on the hostile like the good soldier he used to be. Something that still lurked beneath Dr John Sheppard’s gentler persona.

God, he looked good enough to eat and Mer couldn’t suppress a smile from creeping across their stunned face. John was here, against all hope. All the things they wanted to say and never thought they would have the chance. But it would have to wait. Their heart fluttered wildly in their chest, hands beginning to shake.

‘Can we restrain her please? And muzzle her, in an ideal world,’ was all Mer said, voice dripping with loathing.

Lorne set to work with cable ties and pulled Blondie up to her feet.

‘Belinda Riley? Wow, Rodney, you’ve bagged us a real prize here,’ Cam smirked, ‘she works for the president.’

Zelenka came in next, and simply threw himself at Mer, gabbling in over-emotional Czech and hugging them tightly. As soon as Blondie . . . Belinda, was secured, John relaxed his gaze away from her and snapped it onto Mer. And just looked, and looked and looked, like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

There were a million things to say, only there really weren’t. This was just too big for Mer’s heart to take in.

‘We gotta go,’ was all John said, his voice thick. He managed a wild-eyed smile that said a whole lot more.

‘Oh – Priya, Chanis?’ Mer suddenly remembered the risk of their friends already being dead and their chest seized up.

‘Safe. We beamed them out using the jumper’s transporter. Priya’s newer subcu’ is how we found the location, alongside intel from our SGC mole about sudden developments in ZPM research. The lab level’s shielded so we couldn’t locate you or get you out. Come on, we’ll explain once we’re in the jumper.’

The group set off down the corridor, with Mer and Radek flanked by John and Evan, and Cam strong-arming Belinda. Then John put a hand to his ear and swore, and Mer held their breath.

‘Priya says they’ve extended the shielding, we can’t beam out at all now. Guess we have to fight our way out.’ His face was grim.

 _At least the shield only blocks signals and communications – we can walk through it,_ Mer thought, instantly formulating a plan.

‘Jumper’s on the roof?’ Mer asked.

‘Yep.’

‘I think I can make sure the elevator doesn’t stop,’ Mer smirked.

‘Of course,’ John smiled, handing Mer a slim tablet from his tac vest. God, it was like old times and almost a thrill to be doing this now John was here.

They reached the top floor and took the stairs to the roof without incident. As they emerged onto the roof garden, Mer froze. Two dozen troops in black had machine guns trained on them.

‘Don’t worry about them,’ John smirked, but as he said it the troops opened fire.

Their bullets bounced impotently off the jumper’s shield, ricocheting satisfyingly back at them, taking a few of them down and sending the rest into chaos.

‘Like I was _not_ going to use the shield to protect our exit,’ John grinned.

When Mer looked puzzled, Radek explained, ‘We extended it all the way down to the lab. We were inside it the whole time.’

They made it into the jumper, where Priya and Chanis were waiting. Lorne jumped into the pilot seat and took off, with Cam riding shotgun.

‘Oh god, Mer!’ Another Priya/Chanis three-way hug with opposite feelings from their parting that morning. John watched on with a curious smile on his face. Mer held John’s gaze and backed off from their friends, feeling suddenly shy.

‘Come here,’ they managed, looking at John intently.

John just looked at his feet. ‘You sure you don’t wanna hug Cam and Evan first?’ His mouth was twitching.

Mer closed the gap and grabbed John tightly by the shoulders, piercing him with a look. ‘Ah, the wisecracking flyboy, haven’t seen him for a while. Now where’s my John?’

John let out a breath that was almost a sob. ‘Honestly? He’s waiting for you back in Atlantis. This flyboy is going to get you home to our kid.’ But then John buried his face in Mer’s neck and clung fast, like he was never going to let go again. Mer realised with shock that John was shaking, and then realised it wasn’t just John.

**Date: Atlantean Calendar Year 5 Southern Spring Equinox +63**

**[Earth date: March 17 th, 2021]**

**Location:** **Atlantis**

_He’s home._

John could feel the tension draining out of him as soon as they gated back from the Alpha site, just ninety minutes after they left Earth. It had been a short trip via hyperspace in the small UN ship assigned to cover their Earth operation. Belinda Riley was being taken to the brig, and a small crowd of Lanteans were greeting a very overwhelmed Rodney, Priya and Chanis.

Their mole in SGC (John suspected it was Bill Lee) confirmed the ZPM research was destroyed, and Rodney’s virus had fried a few key systems in the process, setting them further back than they were when they kidnapped Rodney. Good.

Cam and Evan had headed to the Millers and sent word Rodney’s sister and family were now safe under the Jumper’s shield, packing up for a permanent move to Atlantis. They wouldn’t be safe on Earth now. They had already been preparing for the move over, this just nudged their schedule forward by a couple of months.

Suddenly, all was right with John’s world.

Well okay, all was weird with his world and there was clearly a lot to talk about, but it was going to be okay. Just as soon as he stopped shaking.

Well okay, there may be a lot of therapy in all their futures, but yesterday, he reminded himself, he’d believed he was never going to see Rodney again, and now here he was, a bit messed up – well, a lot messed up – bony and scarred and a little wild around the eyes but _here_.

John’s legs were suddenly shaking too much to hold him. Shit, he was going to have to just sit down for a second. He sank to the gateroom step and watched everyone interacting. Teyla hugging Rodney and Priya and crying all the tears John hadn’t been able to yet, and then Ronon running in with Selin in tow and _jesus_ seeing her jump into Rodney’s arms and cling onto him just about broke John. Ronon wrapped himself around both of them and damn, if Ronon wasn’t crying too. And okay, maybe John’s face was a bit wet and maybe it was getting a little hard to force the air into his lungs but really, everything was okay.

And then those piercing blue eyes were on him again, and Rodney was saying something to Selin and carrying her over to him.

‘Seems like your daddy’s in bad shape, Selin. I think we need to take care of him right now.’

John looked at Rodney and he seemed so damn calm. ‘How are you not a mess?’ He asked earnestly, his voice shaking.

‘Oh, I’m going to be. I think I'll be having a medium sized breakdown in, um, a week or so. In the meantime, I have time to be there for you during yours.’ He put a hand on John’s shoulder and squeezed and the touch damn near sent John off into space. John put his hand over Rodney’s and met his eyes in a silent plea for . . . he wasn’t really sure what.

‘I’m a bit tired,’ Rodney said, ‘and it’s past this one’s bedtime, even if it’s still morning for me. I think maybe some food and then the three of us can get to bed.’

‘Ronon sleeps with us now!’ Selin proclaimed, and John winced, but Rodney just smiled.

‘Good, then we’d better tell him where we’re going, and to catch up in a little while.’ Then he looked at John, ‘things aren’t going to go back exactly the way they were. But it’ll be ok.’

John’s heart clenched when he said that, but then Rodney leaned forward and kissed him and it was brief, but oh, so full of fire. ‘It’ll be okay,’ he said again, and John knew he was saying that for both of them.

They went for Satedan kebabs again, which was getting to be a bad habit, but Rodney had really missed them. Rodney looked overwhelmed by the busy restaurant, even in their usual nook at the back, but that was nothing unusual. John was watching him constantly as if something terrible was going to happen any minute, or as if he might break spectacularly. He noticed Selin had the same watchful look on her face. But Rodney was more or less himself – a little quiet and self-contained, but not so different from the too-many other times they had sat at their usual table and eaten the same three things off the menu.

When they turned in Rodney insisted Ronon stay with them. ‘Let’s not disrupt her routine any more than me reappearing has already done,’ he said sensibly, but John sensed it was more than that. Maybe Rodney needed his whole family to be close right now. He wondered what it was like for him to be separated from Priya and Chanis, and if he’d have them pile into the big bed as well if he could. He resolved to talk to Rodney about that as soon as possible. He could see the bond that the three had developed, particularly between Rodney and Chanis. Something about that nudged at him, like there was a thing he was missing, but maybe he could think about that tomorrow. He was so _tired_.

John slept better than he had in two months, his head against Rodney’s, hand in his hair, Selin lying between them. Ronon stretched against Rodney’s back, he seemed almost as relieved to have him back as John was himself.

_I knew you loved him, big guy._

Every couple of hours, John stirred, looked across and reassured himself he wasn’t dreaming. Sometimes he caught Rodney doing the same, and their eyes held each other’s silently in the Lantean moonlight.

Selin’s little hands clung tight to Rodney’s T-shirt the whole night long, but at least she slept.

In the morning, the three of them took a protesting Selin to school, then Ronon went to work. He was still Head of Offworld Liaison, but his team had more than quadrupled since he took on the role.

They had word the Millers were safe in transit, due if all went to plan later in the day.

John had Rodney to himself at last.

_How the hell do you grab hold of someone you’ve just spent two months trying to let go of?_

‘I can’t imagine what it was like for you both,’ Rodney said, searching John’s eyes.

‘What it was like for _me?_ Jesus, Rodney, I just sat here and cried, you’re the one who was in danger.’ He traced the line of Rodney’s newly broken nose, stroked his hand over bony hips, traced new scars with his fingers.

‘They starved me and tortured me for a month, and they broke me, and I’m going to need a shit-ton of therapy but I’m trying not to think about it.’ Rodney said it so matter-of-factly that John realised he must be dissociating from what had happened. Oh boy, that probably meant a rough ride ahead. He knew the shape of it, knew how long it took to put yourself back together after being tortured. What it was like to learn things about yourself you never wanted to know.

John felt a surge of anger and imagined going straight down to the brig and putting a bullet between Belinda Riley’s eyes. But instead he just pulled Rodney close and pressed kisses into his temple, his hair, his neck. Nothing really mattered except helping Rodney be okay again. It wasn’t like getting through trauma was unfamiliar territory for any of them, the whole family knew the twists and turns of trauma recovery.

Rodney continued, as if he was confessing, ‘also, I spent most of the last month trying to figure ways of killing myself before I doomed two galaxies. And I couldn’t figure out how to do it. Which was totally maddening.’ This made John feel cold all over. He held his hand over Rodney’s heart just to feel it beating.

‘I knew you weren’t looking for me. I knew you thought I was gone, and I kept thinking what that would be like for you both, and honestly? _That_ was the hardest thing to bear out of all of it. I still shudder to think what it must have been like for you, and what it must be like right now having a ghost walk back into your life.’

‘Like I don’t know what to do with myself, or with you.’ John said honestly, his voice a little rough.

‘Yeah, I get that.’ Rodney’s hand traced John’s stubbled jaw. His blue eyes were a little wide, and John was beginning to see the extent of how lost he was, what a tough road lay ahead. ‘Can we maybe just cuddle for a bit?’

‘Sure,’ John said, and twined his arms around Rodney’s bony body, relearning the shape of him, feeling shy and tentative. He pressed his lips to Rodney’s, wanting to show affection, but feeling an intense spark of electricity. They deepened the kiss and in moments they were trying to climb inside each other, desperate for each other’s touch, warmth, skin. Heat ramped up between them until it almost burned. And then they were moving against each other frantically, all thrust and teeth and tearing and clinging until they came against each other, both crying out and sobbing into each other’s skin.

After, they snoozed for a long while. But John had something else on his mind, something that had been nagging at him since the jumper ride back, something about Chanis and Priya and how they interacted with Rodney. He thought about it for a bit, and then figured it out – like seeing one of those old magic eye pictures that used to drive him nuts. It was obvious, really, at least he thought it was, and he kicked himself for not picking it up sooner. Because amid all the bad, this was something good – really good.

‘Hey,’ he carefully planted a kiss on his lover’s temple, feeling loving and gentle again after the fire of earlier.

‘What’s up?’ Those blue eyes looked at him with breathtaking intensity.

_Spit it out, Sheppard._

‘Did you . . . Did you finally come out as non-binary and I missed it?’ John felt hesitant in saying it, but he was sure he wasn’t wrong. Priya and Chanis had called him _Mer_ and _they_ and he, like a fool, had blundered on without really thinking about what that meant.

‘Er . . . yes?’ there was a little trepidation there, but John just felt relieved. He had believed for two months that they would never get a chance to have this conversation.

‘Okay . . . Mer . . .’ John dropped a kiss on ~~his~~ their lips, and then another, and then he caught himself smiling the most genuine smile he’d experienced for months. Mer’s own smile was a beautiful reflection of his and it made his heart ache in all the right ways.

‘Congratulations,’ John said. ‘Bout time.’

Mer looked surprised and pleased and then wow, the love was pouring out of those blue eyes and filling John up and the ache of loss and loneliness he’d been carrying so long was finally being washed away. Mer put their hand up to his cheek and kissed him, long and slow.

‘Donated all your boy clothes anyway,’ John tried for lighthearted, but halfway through the sentence his voice broke as he was pulled back into that overwhelming feeling of loss that still clung to him. Mer’s face looked equally stricken as they acknowledged just what that must have meant, what they both had been going through these past months. John tilted his head against Mer’s and felt them shaking, ever so slightly.

_And so the reaction to all this shit begins. But we’ll get through this, together._

He felt sad and lost and fucked up and found and happy and contented and honestly, that almost passed for normal in the Pegasus galaxy. As long as Mer was here, the two of them could get through anything and make it good.

**Author's Note:**

> CN: the story contains temporary major character death and a canon character coming out as trans/non-binary.
> 
> Please note that neither Two Spirit nor India’s Third Gender is really analogous with or interchangeable with non-binary – it’s way more complicated than that and each culture has its own way of navigating gender diversity which it’s important not to appropriate.
> 
> Also please note, fanfic writers – trans people do not exist just to be a sexual fetish for others, and don't have to be submissive - trans people are people :-)
> 
> Finally, I make no claim that the real UN is the benign organisation portrayed here, or that it is ever likely to stand up to US dominion.


End file.
